pic: We left the boys at home

[Schnabel]

Originally Posted by whytheheckme

I don't believe in any respect that females are the 'weakest' members of any team. On our team, all of the drivers get equal practice time, including the girls. Our girls have all of the 'chances' that our guys have, right from the start. I don't believe that we need to send ONLY girls to a regional for them to have an equal opportunity; in fact, I believe that sending a co-ed team gives EVERYONE an equal opportunity, because everyone who is eligible to participate is at the event, and the driver with the best skills and the most probability to win drives that match. Our girls are in no way 'rookies', unless if they are truely rookies to the team.

I'm still a little bit confused as to why your whole team couldnt travel, and perhaps you let some inexperienced drivers drive, and if they were girls, great. It appears that the male members of your team DID seem to mind, at least a first, that they couldn't compete simply because they were male.

I really don't want to make a big deal here, and I hate posts about people complaining about other's ideals and beliefs. But this is a topic that I personally find very disturbing and disheartening. If a team wants their girls to have the same experience as the boys, I believe that they should have the SAME opportunity, and not be given special treatment, simply because they are girls.

Please don't get me wrong. I completely support girls in FIRST in EVERY aspect, I would love to see a pure 50-50 mix, both in numbers, and in 'job' opportunity. But creating an environment in which to fix the situation, you simply eliminate the boys, I don't think is in the spirit of FIRST.

Perhaps this post is very radical, and I may get bashed because of it. But I am simply standing for what I believe is right, and perhaps some others agree with me.

This is just an opinion. I am not forcing it on anyone.

Jacob

I really agree with him in the fact that the true FIRST team was to get EVERYONE involved in science and engineering. If you ask me, a team with both guys and girls is better because then the girls can get used to having to compete with the guys that are there trying for the same thing. If in FIRST you take away the guys so that the girls can get an experience, then, if you ask me, you have taken away the true experience as a major corporation won't get rid of the guys just to give a girl the job. They would rather find the person who has the best skill. If it is a guy, then so be it, but if it is a girl, then so be it. Just because there is a difference in gender doesn't mean that there is a difference in skill.

[dapub]

As a mentor, and female engineer, I really have to jump in here. While I think that it is important to give girls experience and confidence in engineering, I think some of the comments posted here are insensitive to girls' ability. They may thrive better in an all girls' environment as far as learning experience is concerned ( I actually went to an all girls' high school.... where there was less intimidation from the boys, and you didn't have to worry about how 'cute' you were in class.) This made us stronger and more assertive, and certainly prepared me to go into school for engineering (where only 7% of my graduating engineering class were girls - back in the Dark Ages.)

But.... I have a problem with this post. To say that the girls are weaker - blanket statement - is not helping their cause. Girls will not be treated equally until they are seen as equals - starting on their own teams. As FIRST teams, we have a lot of differences to deal with. Our team is extremely diverse - we have a mix of inner-city (minority) youth, suburban (non-minority) youth, deaf youth, hearing youth, males and females. Everyone has their issues. I think many of you would take offense if any of these other populations (besides boys) were singled out. "We left our white kids home." "We left our hispanic kids home." "We left our deaf kids home." Although it was just a tag line on a photo, it is an inflamatory remark for the average male member on a FIRST team. It would not be tolerated in any of these other instances.

That said, I can see the advantages of what team 842 is doing. If you keep a group in their comfort zone, they may actually gain the skills and confidence necessary to compete in a heterogeneous work world. As a team, we all have decisions to make on how best to handle our populations equally, without discriminating against any one group. Perhaps forming an all girl team is a way to go, as long as there is an all boy team available.

We, again, have some of the same issues - who has more confidence, and thus becomes more dominant on a team - the wealthier white kids, the hearing kids, the boys, the urban macho kids???.... It is a cute balancing act. As a team, we try to treat everyone as equals - no matter what their ability or background is. But everyone team member is also expected to meet certain expectation levels. So I would not agree to letting a member attend a regional, if they put, say 20 hours into build, half-heartedly, because they were of a certain gender, race, etc., over another student who put 300 hours in, full bore - because they are of another gender, race, etc. What is the incentive to work hard, and put your full effort in, if you will not be rewarded for it, and, in fact be penalized, because you are a certain gender, race, etc. What does it teach the kid who put in less effort - "aw, that's OK, we'll let you go anyway because you're (fill in the blank...gender, race, etc.)" You don't need to meet the expectation? [This is not what I am saying that 842 did with their girls - I am just making a philosophical point.]

I don't know what the answer is - same gender teams, same race teams, same socio-economic class teams, same teams with disabilities.... Any way you slice it, someone is going to get hurt, unless equal opportunity is provided to everyone. An all-girls team sounds good, as long as there is an all-boys team. The one thing that we have found from including everyone together on our team this year, is that we all have learned an awful lot this year. Our hearing kids and mentors have learned so much from our deaf kids and mentors, and vise versa. Our girls have learned to be more aggressive. Our inner-city students coming from lower quality schools have had higher expectations to live up to - and have done a stellar job. Everyone has become a lot stronger through this experience.

2 schools of thought - both have their pros/cons.

[Mikell Taylor]

Originally Posted by whytheheckme

Quote:
Originally Posted by falconmaster View Post

One side note to all this, as a mentor I saw how teams and people treated us differently between being co-ed to all girls.....

Perhaps you can elaborate.

Jacob, I can elaborate. I was on an all-girls' team in high school (team 677). We were at an all-girls' school. You're treated very differently. We had scouts coming trying to ask our (male) mentors questions instead of us; even when our mentors pushed the scouts to us, they kept going back to the men. My teammate and I were both drivers in 2001, and thus responsible for fixing the robot in between matches; while sitting in the pit replacing the entire drivetrain, we had some scouts come up and ask us if they could ask questions. When we said yes, they looked uncomfortable, then said "well, can we talk to someone who knows what they're doing?" In 2002 at our regional, we had scouts ask us, and I am not making this up, "How'd you guys build a robot without any guys on the team?"

The team I mentored in college, though the most involved, most committed members on the team were actually three girls, still had a problem with scouts coming up and asking the couple of guys in the pit questions. They never went to the girls first. Never. Why?

Several other things happened, too, which I won't go in to here right now, but I can explain further over PM.

At any rate, the sexism is there, and I congratulate you (and others in this thread) on your enlightenment when it comes to "affirmative action" and reverse discrimination in FIRST and the rest of the world. I tend to agree. It shouldn't be that way. But it often is necessary, because the world can suck, and I struggle with this daily as a female engineer in the working world. We haven't, as a society, found the balance yet between the way it is (white males tend to have the advantage) and the way it should be (a balance of all genders, races, backgrounds, etc).

So what I'm worried about is that we are faulting the women in that picture for the fact that society hasn't figured itself out yet. Girls, good for you! I'm glad you got a chance to go experience a FIRST regional as an all-girls' team. It's a very valuable and very eye-opening experience, and I hope you'll share these experiences with your other teammates and mentors... I have the feeling the ones who didn't attend the regional will be getting just as much out of it as you did.

[whytheheckme]

Originally Posted by Mikell Taylor

But it often is necessary, because the world can suck, and I struggle with this daily as a female engineer in the working world. We haven't, as a society, found the balance yet between the way it is (white males tend to have the advantage) and the way it should be (a balance of all genders, races, backgrounds, etc).

So how is excluding the boys helping this situation? If you are trying to simulate the real world and teach your deals to cope with situations which may involve discrimination, then excluding the boys does nothing to aid this. If someone comes over to your team asking for info about your bot, why doesn't one of your girls step in and say, "I can help you with that!"

Originally Posted by Mikell Taylor

I have the feeling the ones who didn't attend the regional will be getting just as much out of it as you did.

How? This is my point exactly. For me, as a white male, I know that I wouldn't get 'as much out of the event' by not attending... I guess my point is that the girls could do any job on the team, with or without boys there. Sending an all-girl team to have the experience what 'its like' to be an all-girl team at an event is un-realistic, and in my opinion, not only does nothing for them, but can hurt them by providing this unreal experience that they will never experience in the real world. There are no (none that I know of) all-girl engineering firms, simply because there is a company policy saying that only females can work there. In fact, I belive that this is against the law. There may, however, be all-girl engineering firms based on merit and qualification. This, in my opinion, is great.

Jacob

[JamesBrown]

Alright, up until this point I was just reading and waiting to hear the details from a team member or mentor, now that we have I would like to start out by pointing out that 842 is not suggesting that every one leave the male members of their The goal of FIRST is to introduce people to Science and Engineering with the hope of guiding them to a related career. If you read either of the 842 mentor’s posts you will see that that was why they did this and that they believe it worked. Because of long held prejudices the ratio of Males to Females in Science and Engineering is no where near 1:1, in order to counteract 100's of years of prejudice in the field it is pretty obvious you can't just say well if you want to do this then you can. It is necessary to introduce people directly to engineering. Do a search for summer engineering programs and you will find many for girls. Almost every major engineering school holds an open house or other events for just girls (as well as for minorities and other under represented groups). These types of intervention are necessary in many cases.

If your team has no need to do this then don't but please don't tell these guys that exposing parts of the team to engineering because those members hadn't had enough opportunity is against the spirit of FIRST because quite frankly it is not.

[whytheheckme]

Originally Posted by JamesBrown

If your team has no need to do this then don't but please don't tell these guys that exposing parts of the team to engineering because those members hadn't had enough opportunity is against the spirit of FIRST because quite frankly it is not.

I'm not suggesting exposing parts of their team to engineering is against the spirit of FIRST. I'm simply suggesting that excluding part of their team based on their gender is not in the spirit of FIRST. I think that it's great that these girls on this team had an opportunity to experience things that they hadn't before, but this could have been accomplished (im my opinion) without excluding the boys.

Imagine if this post was the other way around, and the title read "We left the girls at home." I think that this would raise greater controversy, even though in reality, you are creating the same situation.

Jacob

[JaneYoung]

To travel to 3 regionals and the Championship is no small feat. Students, teachers, mentors, parents - all have school, jobs to contend with and juggle. This team has been known as a co-ed team. To take a travel team to one of the regionals that is made up of girls, encouraged more active participation, involvement, ownership of the experience on the part of all the members. It also encouraged the team to step away from their own perceptions of who they are and experiment/experience the depth of their team strengths and land on their feet. Those feet are taking the steps toward a changed culture.
Good luck in Atlanta, Team 842.
Jane

[Andy Baker]

Major kudos to team 842. They have chosen to participate in a unique way that attempts to make females more involved in science and technology than they have in the past.

Andy B.

[whytheheckme]

Originally Posted by JaneYoung

To take a travel team to one of the regionals that is made up of girls, encouraged more active participation, involvement, ownership of the experience on the part of all the members.

All of the female members. What about males on the team that struggle to take the initiative to participate more activly. If this was the goal of the segregation of the members to participate on the trip, then I would have sent all of the team members who had little-to-no experience, both boys and girls. Even then, I still think that I would have a fundamental problem with sending only people who don't take an active role on the team; The people who are very active on the team worked very hard to get to this point (going to regionals), and are not being excluded for something they couldn't control.

I spent over 200 hours this build season progging our bot. If I was told that I couldnt go to one of two regionals and/or champs simply because I was male, I would probably leave my team. I would be frustrated greatly, seeing that I raised all of the required money to go on trips, and stayed overnight several nights working on the bot. I got used to being the only person in the school both before and after everyone got there. I agree that people who didn't have the opportunity to participate this much should have a chance to play more active roles at the competition, but I don't think that this detracts from what I put into the team. To correlate, I'm sure that the girls put quite a bit of effort into building their bot at home in Jan and Feb, but I'm sure that the boys put in equal effort. In my opinion, not allowing them to travel simply because they are male is both discouraging and unjust.

This is a sticky situation, because I can definatly see the argument of most (seems like everyone) of everyone else posting here. Sending an all-girls team definitely benefits the girls in some aspects (in my opinion, can hurt them in some ways, but thats another issue). But on the flip side, my point is that the boys who worked hard to get to the same point couldn't travel due to their gender.

My team is about 25% deaf. Does this mean that we should send only deaf team members to one of the regionals we go to, simply to have them see whats its like to not have to work with hearing members on our team, and to have to deal with hearing members on other teams.

This is not a realistic situation, because in almost no conditions in the real world would deaf engineers be working only with other deaf engineers. And in almost no situation would deaf engineers be required to communicate with hearing clients without the assistance of hearing colleges.

Originally Posted by JaneYoung

Good luck in Atlanta, Team 842.

Absolutely. Best of luck to team 842, as well as all of the teams participating in ATL.

Jacob

[Libby K]

Good luck in atlanta, 842!
I wish my team could do something like that, but
a) We only went to one regional
b) There would only be two of us there!

What a great way to get the girls REALLY into the team. I know being on a team with a lot of guys can be kind of intimidating.

[!DOM!]

Originally Posted by Liz Smith

I know that some schools are going that route. My old high school now has an all girls team(1929) in addition to their Co-ed team (555) which also has girls on it. Both teams show support for each other. I believe this year the Sciborgs(1155) from NY also did the same thing and support their all girl team the FeMaidens(2265).

Whats the point of having two teams from one school?
Why is one all girls? Why not all boys? just wondering
I dont think there should be an all girls/boys team.

[will_freer]

I am from team 842 and I think it was a great idea for us to let the girls to go to a competition to see what it feels like to compete without any guys.

[paragongurl]

i love teams who are made out all gurls......it finally shows that gurls can do anything!

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by whytheheckme

I spent over 200 hours this build season progging our bot. If I was told that I couldnt go to one of two regionals and/or champs simply because I was male, I would probably leave my team. I would be frustrated greatly, ...

Jacob

Jacob,

It was one of 3 regionals. And did you miss the part where they said they knew everyone wouldn't go to every regional? That they said team members couldn't miss that much school to attend all the regionals? Did you miss the part where they said many of the girls then didn't go to the following regional?

Choosing to send only the girls to one regional was just a method of deciding which regional(s) the team members - any and all of them, regardless of gender - would attend. That it gave them a unique experience - an all girls team for one regional - was a bonus.

[whytheheckme]

Originally Posted by GaryV1188

And did you miss the part where they said they knew everyone wouldn't go to every regional? That they said team members couldn't miss that much school to attend all the regionals?

No, I did not miss this part. This does not explain why they segregated the people who went to this regional. If missing school was an issue, then each student should have attended the same number of regionals.

Originally Posted by GaryV1188

It was one of 3 regionals.... [] ... Did you miss the part where they said many of the girls then didn't go to the following regional?

Choosing to send only the girls to one regional was just a method of deciding which regional(s) the team members - any and all of them, regardless of gender - would attend. That it gave them a unique experience - an all girls team for one regional - was a bonus.

I agree that sending an all girls team could be an added value. And since many of the girls could not attend the following regional, why not make that an all-boys regional, so that the boys could have the same experience? This would make perfect sense to me (having one girls, one boys, and one co-ed regional)... And if this did happen, would there have been a post that said "We left the girls at home" ? I am simply after providing an equal opportunity to each student.

Our team is an comprised of an intercity school. We have a considerably high percentage of minority students compared to most other teams (that i've seen, perhaps I can be pleasantly surprised and be corrected on this)(somewhere near 35-40%). This is another, sadly, underprivileged group, just as girls are. However, we do not send the minority students away to a competition just for them to experience what it's like to be an all minority team. We would never consider this. These students are just as much a part of the team as anyone else, and people who travel are based on merit and fundraising requirements and time put in etc.

At first, when I made my first comment to this thread, I thought that perhaps I could be completely off-base about this issue. However, I have recieved SEVERAL PMs from various people who feel the same as I do. I think that these people are perhaps afraid to post because what I'm saying is probably not politically correct. I really don't care about politically correctness, I only care about whats right. And if my Rep goes to hell because of that, fine. They're just dots. But what I'm talking about is something much deeper than that.

The whole point of all of these posts is that everyone on the team should have an equal opportunity in every aspect. If it is decided to send an all-girls team, why not send an all-boys team the next time? I believe that both of these event could be a positive experience. But not creating an equal opportunity is just wrong.

On my team, there are 4 students going to ATL on Wed. night. Some of them asked if they could go to the 'prom'. The answer was immediatly 'no', because the rest of the team wasn't there, and it would not be fair to them. Just because these students were fortunate enough to qualify to come early (the rest of the team is coming late thurs night to save $ on hotel) doesn't mean that you can go out and do things without the rest of the team. If the team doesn't go, you don't go. Period.

Now the majority of you reading this thread are probably like "Shut up Jake! Stop posting and make this thread get off the portal page!" I guess I do sound like one person complaining. And perhaps I'll shut up now. This is just a subject that really, really bothers me (Equal Opportunity). I just wanted to express my opinion on this matter, and make my stance clear.

Remember, They're Just Dots!

Jacob