Volunteer Screening?

[DaBruteForceGuy]

Originally posted by djcapelis
<sarcasm> Look, if the guys on the team can't even get some... if a sexual preditor does there is going to be holy hell to deal with. </sarcasm>

*smacks himself for joking about such a serious topic, hits the submit button anyways.

....amazing, absolutely amazing....

I think I've posted about this somewhere else but I'll say it again just so it gets somewhere. At what age do you stop being a student and become an adult? I hate to say this but...well...some students are rather old. In Delaware, especially in the public system, it isn't uncommon to have a senior graduate at 19. He is still a student yet an adult, by atleast a year, at the same time. Should he too then be required to have a background check done? And what about these kids you see on news programs who are 14-16 raped, beating, sexual molest, and/or just being cruel to other kids? What if one of those kids ended up on a team? I know there are applications and you have to show you want to be there for our team but still...you can't catch everything. I think what FIRST is doing is smart and safe, and I am all for it but I just question at how effective it is going to be. How do you know you don't have an 18 yr old senior with track record that would make you shudder? And....should you be checking your students too? Where does the line begin and end. I worry far too much for my age but you have to understand, someone has too...don't they?

[generalbrando]

There have been threads dedicated to warnings about problems that have occured on teams - problems that likely would have been prevented had background checks been done. I'm not saying this will really prevent everything bad from happening.

The reality is that if everyone of you opens you wallet, your online banking service, or your check book - you'll find that you can infact spare $10 somewhere in there. Maybe you have to wait till the next pay check - but I won't believe that someone can't come up with $10. I'm a broke college student on total aid and I could spare twice that. So if you have hundreds of checks to perform - you should probably just ask the individuals to hand over $10. Yes, that's backward because they are volunteering. However, if they really want to volunteer they will understand that you simply can't meet this requirement without $10 from them.

I don't see this as a major problem, so I'm approaching it lightly. This will make things a little more complicated and you can argue "at what cost?" The cost may be a couple days of paper work and a few absent engineers. The gain may be that the bright faces you see at your meetings will not be killed or mollested.

Katie, the way I understand it, a parent dropping off food or stopping by to see what's going on would not require a back ground check. The sponsors, assuming they aren't there every night, shouldn't need one either. And as for saying that someone will know something is up: teams are larger or smaller and organized differently. It is possible that they would not notice something is up.

Yes, I understand FIRST is covering themselves as well. But as for Bill's comment about team policies: that may be a good idea. However, what is Team Hammond's policy (I'd never heard there was one when I was on the team) and for the rest of you - do you have a policy and would you make one just because FIRST suggested one?

Any way you cut it, it looks like we'll have to deal with it for this year. Maybe next year FIRST can lower the price or provide more alternatives. I wouldn't, however, suggest to them that they get rid of it.

[jneumiller]

Originally Posted by generalbrando

The reality is that if everyone of you opens you wallet, your online banking service, or your check book - you'll find that you can infact spare $10 somewhere in there. Maybe you have to wait till the next pay check - but I won't believe that someone can't come up with $10. I'm a broke college student on total aid and I could spare twice that. So if you have hundreds of checks to perform - you should probably just ask the individuals to hand over $10. Yes, that's backward because they are volunteering. However, if they really want to volunteer they will understand that you simply can't meet this requirement without $10 from them.

GEN Brando...you're missing the point from the older and wiser folks among us. This is very much akin to putting a frog into a pot of room temperature water and then turning up the heat a little bit at a time. For those of us that don't want to become "frog soup" it's not about money. It's about assuming the worst about people that have no proven reason for being distrusted.

I like the idea of allowing the schools involved to come up with their own vetting process. If they decide to use state databases of sexual predators (and let's be honest folks...that's what's at issue here) to check out mentors, then so be it...but to do this at the national level....putting money into someone's pocket to pretty much do the same thing is outlandish.

If my security clearance isn't good enough to prove I'm trustworthy...then I guess I'll just not be able to participate in the reindeer games.

See you on the high ground!

Jim

[BerserkerSpyke]

Originally posted by Brm789
I think I've posted about this somewhere else but I'll say it again just so it gets somewhere. At what age do you stop being a student and become an adult? I hate to say this but...well...some students are rather old. In Delaware, especially in the public system, it isn't uncommon to have a senior graduate at 19. He is still a student yet an adult, by atleast a year, at the same time. Should he too then be required to have a background check done? And what about these kids you see on news programs who are 14-16 raped, beating, sexual molest, and/or just being cruel to other kids? What if one of those kids ended up on a team? I know there are applications and you have to show you want to be there for our team but still...you can't catch everything. I think what FIRST is doing is smart and safe, and I am all for it but I just question at how effective it is going to be. How do you know you don't have an 18 yr old senior with track record that would make you shudder? And....should you be checking your students too? Where does the line begin and end. I worry far too much for my age but you have to understand, someone has too...don't they?

And then there are teams made completely of college students (Team 190 of WPI for example). Are these students considered "adults" by FIRST?
Plus, how can FIRST expect people to give up the privacy of their past, maybe their acidents or just stupid mistakes, to volunteer to help a group of kids? Many people have secrets in their pasts that haunt them or they may have even redeemed for. Does a simple organization, a structured group activity, have the right to reveal the past of people just because they are above a certain age?

[Steve W]

Yes to most of your questions. As a Parent I want to know who my children are with. As a Mentor I want the parents to know who their child is with. Before FIRST brought this into effect I volunteered to get the police check done and I paid for it. As an outsider to the school, shouldn't I be willing to help make others comfortable. FIRST is a great program and well worth the time invested. I feel it should continue with as safe as enviorment as possible.
I know that there is never any for sures BUT do we want to take chances with our young people. Once you are no longer a student you become a mentor. It has nothing to do with being an adult. Many who know me say that I have never grown up and I have been out of school for over 30 years. Question might be "who is an adult?"

Originally posted by Steve W
Yes to most of your questions. As a Parent I want to know who my children are with. As a Mentor I want the parents to know who their child is with. Before FIRST brought this into effect I volunteered to get the police check done and I paid for it. As an outsider to the school, shouldn't I be willing to help make others comfortable. FIRST is a great program and well worth the time invested. I feel it should continue with as safe as enviorment as possible.
I know that there is never any for sures BUT do we want to take chances with our young people. Once you are no longer a student you become a mentor. It has nothing to do with being an adult. Many who know me say that I have never grown up and I have been out of school for over 30 years. Question might be "who is an adult?"

Exactly, who is an adult? I hate to say this but...everyone (students and adults) over the age of 14 should have a background check just to be sure. I doubt highly that anyone will show up anything on their record but wouldn't it make it safer for the rest of us? Don't you want to be sure you know the kid next to you isn't going to try and rape you? There are only three girls on my team (and some teams are all one sex) but that doesn't mean anything. That only means that there are less of a chance...but there is that chance. Too many bad things have happened to good people. FiRST was created to be a place to have students go to learn about Science and Technology in a safe and fun manner. They require us to wear safety glasses and not to do things that would be unsafe so I find this newest requirement great. I want to be safe and I want my fellow teammates to be safe. I'm not an adult and I'm not a mother but that doesn't mean I don't worry about others like a parent would. I do worry. I worry about my friends.

This is a great idea and I appluad it. I just feel that it should be done to everyone. If you are a freshman in high school, you should have a background check and if you have a team that is organized in manner that it is not associated with one school (such as MOE) then I think that there should at the very least be a look given to the school records. Has the student been suspended? Expelled? Why? How many detetenions have they received that year? For what? I mean, come on. Do you really want a student on the team who has been suspended three times in the past year for fighting with other students? I do not mean to say that this should just be the main factor of whither they are in or not but rather that it should be a peice of thought that is there. Think about this guys. You are trusting complete strangers with your life every single time you walk in that door. Every time you sit down and start a meeting, you are trust the people around you to be honest outstanding members of the community. This newest requirement is only there the ensure that your trust isn't blindly and falsely put into those people.

[Wetzel]

This background check would show nothing that the police do not have. Suspensions and expulsions are part of a school record that would not show up on any background check.

What about the engineers on the team that have already gone through major hoops for clearance at work, or even just to get hired? I had a Virginia State Police background check done has part of becoming an EMT, will that count or will I have to pay another $10 (I spent $60 already on the VSP one) to get the 'sanctioned' background check.

Has anyone received details yet on what what done? All the FIRST website says is

FIRST will contact registered teams via email in October to provide details on how to meet the screening requirements. We believe that these new measures will help provide parents of children who participate in FIRST programs a greater sense of security

I do appreciate how FIRST dosn't even pretend that this will actually increase security, but only the perception thereof.


Wetzel
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Unnecessary and ineffective

[Wetzel]

So anyone seen any info on how to do the background checks?

If they don't figure this out soon, it won't be much good. Teams are already starting to meet often, and it takes time for the checks to actually be run.


Wetzel

[kpugh]

http://forums.chiefdelphi.com/showth...er+screeni ng
Not sure if this is just for FLL or if FIRST Robotics mentors have to do it too.

[Joe Ross]

Originally Posted by Wetzel

So anyone seen any info on how to do the background checks?

FIRST has already provided that information to the main team contact. It is up to the main team contact to go from there.

[JonA]

Here is the e-mail blast archive thread on the FIRST Youth Protection and Adult Leadership policy.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=22968

[Yan Wang]

Let's see...

Our head engineer is the father of two of the people on our team. One of them a junior, one a freshman at RIT.

The head engineer works @ BorgWarner and works sometimes with our 2nd engineer... who is also father of a student on the team, also a junior.

Our electrical engineer was father of someone who used to be on the team.

My dad works with the first 2 mentioned engineers at BorgWarner... I have known these people for a long time, along with their kids on the team. Even if the background check fee is waived, it's still a waste of time for our team mentors.

Then again, I also do agree that it won't hurt to do it.

[Anarkissed]

Does anyone else feel slightly disheartened at the fact that people volunteering their time must be scrutinized, making sure they haven't made a mistake in their past which may be seen as something endangering a childs life or wellbeing?

All FIRST Team Mentors are required to complete a standardized internet-based background check process. Adults already screened by a public school system to work with youth are exempt from the application and screening process. A Team Mentor is defined as any adult, 18 or older, who works directly with youth on a FIRST Robotics Competition or FIRST LEGO League team. FIRST will issue separate guidance for teams located outside the United States.

According to this, I as an 18 year old senior that will graduate 19, and vice-president of our team, need a backround check. Can I not take my friend aside during a robotics competition and talk to them privately if they are not an adult?

A friend of mine is 19, in high school, and thinking about being on the team. According to FIRSTS policy it would be necessary for him to pass the background check. I doubt he would. All personal feelings aside, he had a significant other for about a year and she was underage, this resulted in charges being pressed by her parents when they found out how old he was at the time (18). This friend of mine is now permenantly a registered sexual offender in the state of Michigan and it will follow him forever.

This policy of background screening for all adults involved has many implications, most of which were discussed earlier in the thread and I don't feel like reiterating what has already been said by others. This topic does need serious consideration on the part of everyone involved. From parents to mentors to students, this policy needs to be weighed, for all the costs, not just monetary, and the benefits.

A former Prime Minister of England said that you cannot outlaw childhood, no matter what children are going to die. This was in response to many rediculous pieces of legislation that were turning up in England and in the USA. 'Oh no, someone choked to death because of the string in a hooded sweatshirt, lets ban them!' This philosophy can also be applied to crime. Take the sweatshirt strings, as a parallel to the backround checks, it would be similar to putting bright red flashing lights on the ends of the strings in a sweatshirt. You bring attention to them, look at them, but it doesn't really change the fact that in some rare incident, someone is going to get hurt. Humanity is not perfect, must we search everyones past for something publicly known which haunts them. Everyone has at least one skeleton in their closet, last I heard the messiah hasn't returned yet. Each citizen on this planet has things in their past which aren't good, it is a fact of life. If someone has a sufficiently bad past, who's right is it to tell them that they cannot make an attempt to do good to make up for their wrongs.


A slightly unnverved Will Gibbins

[Bill Beatty]

It won't do any good, but I will feel better if I sound off one more time about these ridiculous background checks.

Many of these students will be out of school in a few months. Who is going to protect them after they graduate? Most all of them are 14 years old or older, not exactly young children that would be easy prey.

But a larger issue, what is the criteria and who makes the call as to what is the acceptable background? Is the only concern a sex offender? If that is the area of concern, then call it a sex offender background check. Or, if other areas of background will eliminate you from being on a FIRST team, what are they? Would a murderer be allowed? How about someone convicted of manslaughter? A DUI? Maybe five DUI's? Domestic violence? A drug conviction? A drug user? Someone who smoked or inhaled something? Where do you draw the background line and who decides if a person is in or out? Do we have to go through screening every year? These are real questions concerning an individuals past and maybe affecting their future.

If we keep expanding these types of measures, we are going to create a generation of paranoid, unself-reliant folks unable to make decisions for themselves and demanding that "someone" protect them from all things.

There, I feel much better.