GP? I think not.

[Depreciation]

To start off I would like to say FIRST has been the best program I have ever participated in. I have learned more during my years in it then I have in anyhting else I have ever done, all while having the most fun I have ever had. On the other hand there is one major, consistent problem I have seen. FIRST is a high school robotics competition, so why are there so many teams that seem to have more adult mentors than students? why are there so many teams that seem that whenever in their pits, in pictures, or during time outs, there adults are the ones working on the robots, and they have a number of the adults gathered around the robot with one or two high school students? Well these same teams are the ones that year after year have highly superior robots to any other team. In a competition that prides itself in its "gracious profesionalism" there should not be teams that year after year just completely dominate all the way to the win, but not even at just one regional but sometimes two or three in one year, I find that completely rediculous and definitely NOT GP.

I know im going to hear many argue that FIRST is not about winning, well just stop being so cliche and understand that everyone still desires to do well and no one appreciates working so hard just to have some NASA engineered robot come along every year and beat them without even a slight hope of winning. I understand that the glory of winning eventually fades, and in the end it really is the experience that matters, but it is still a competition. Students spend six hard weeks building and working on something that they want to see succeed just as much as the teams im speaking of do. Its not exactly a great experience or in any way encouraging to put all that effort into something, just to go to the competitions every year to see which team super power is there to dominate them this year.

I think there are many teams that need to think about this and change the way they're team is run, and for the ones who dont, go and horde up all those trophys and banners each year, but make sure you have plenty of fun, because no one else is.

[BigJ]

This has been discussed so many times. Please use the search function! Also, guessing by the name, no team number, and 1 post that you are an anonymous account. Those are not allowed.

Anyway, I am sure there are many robots, built by students AND mentors, maintain by students AND mentors, and driven by students that win competitions. It is so much more than "oh my god their mentors do everything".

Experience, teamwork, and determination all play a bigger role than "mentor bots", in my opinion.

Also, I realize you have not once in your post stated that your opinions are "GP", but I would hope that you keep to your own high standards, even when posting anonymously...

[s_forbes]

Originally Posted by Depreciation

...but make sure you have plenty of fun, because no one else is.

Really? I see everyone having fun at every regional I go to...

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by Depreciation

but make sure you have plenty of fun, because no one else is.

Oh woops, I guess I'll go tell 1712 that we had a miserable time in Philadelphia because we lost to 103 in the QFs. My mistake...

Seriously though, this post is a slap in the face of these successful teams. I suggest you actually speak to them, particularly the students. See how they feel. See what effect the programs have on them.
I also suggest you read around these forums for the threads about GP, mentor involvement, and FIRST in general.
I'll also link a post about my feelings on a part of this matter dealing with success and GP.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...5&postcount=25

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

Oh woops, I guess I'll go tell 1712 that we had a miserable time in Philadelphia because we lost to 103 in the QFs. My mistake...

Seriously though, this post is a slap in the face of these successful teams. I suggest you actually speak to them, particularly the students. See how they feel. See what effect the programs have on them.
I also suggest you read around these forums for the threads about GP, mentor involvement, and FIRST in general.
I'll also link a post about my feelings on a part of this matter dealing with success and GP.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...5&postcount=25

True indeed...

When I first joined I had the usual immature jealousness of amazing teams that made me think similar things. But once I actually talked to students on these "mentor dominated" teams, I realized they are learning more and getting more from the experience than students on teams entirely run by kids.


So, aside from the point of the argument, get to know the students that work hard on those teams before you pass judgement.

[EricH]

I'm with the others--you won't find much support here.

I mentored a team with a grand total of 6 mentors (many of whom weren't always there). We had a lousy record in qualifying and weren't picked, yet the students had a load of fun, even with the mentors getting their hands on the robot from time to time.

I graduated from a team that had more mentors than students for some time. I still had a load of fun. And the mentors were doing about half the work on the robot, but the students were doing the other half. (I think I'm slightly overestimating the mentors' involvement.) Successful? Yes. Fun? YES!!!!

If you go and read those other threads (a search for "mentor-built" or "student-built" should turn up a few), you will find two things in common--they have a tendency to get locked, and nobody really cares other than the thread starter. One of the goals of FIRST is INSPIRATION, and around here, it seems like most people don't really care how the students are inspired.

And if there is a team there that truly is mentor-built, it just makes it that much sweeter when your student-built/combination-built robot beats them.

[Depreciation]

All im really hearing is the expected cliches, and that the students on these teams are learning..

If the students of these said teams are learning a bunch from all this well great! that doesnt mean the way they are doing it is right or dare I say GP, and yes like i said FIRST is still an extremely fun experience, im just pointing out a problem which I have found to be a hindrance to the experience.

"immature jealousness"? Your calling my opinion immature for thinking that teams that are supposedly being profesional and gracious but still put themselves at a very obvious and extreme advantage is unfair and not so profesional...

And as far as anonymous accounts not being allowed goes. I could tell you who I was, but it really wouldnt make a difference.

[Lil' Lavery]

How are these teams not GP? Give us a concrete example.
Are they not GP because they run their team differently from you?
Are they not GP because they win?
Are they not GP because they follow a proven design process and use their past experiences to improve their future robots?

A vast majority of these teams are incredibly Gracious, and nobody can possibly question their professionalism. Just because a team wins does not mean they aren't GP.
In fact, it's clearly against the nature of gracious professionalism to attempt to drag them down to your level rather than rise up to theirs.

[OZ_341]

Just for the record, our machine is 95% student built in a high school woodshop. We do seek and receive engineering help (an important part of FIRST learning) but our kids do it all from concept through build, with simple tooling.

It can be done in a variety of ways. But we don't look down on teams that do it differently than we do. You must find what works for your team.

[dgitz]

Ok, I think that enough criticism of the original message has taken place. I'm sure that most people who have been involved in FIRST for a while would disagree with the original message, but from my experience there are at least some people who have had this opinion from time to time. When I was in high school back in 1996-2000, my teammates sometimes had this opinion, and now as a mentor to a new team, I find my students (and other mentors) having the same opinion. I even see people not affiliated with FIRST at all that have seen a match or two, that have the opinion that the mighty-sponsored teams will stomp everyone. I find this a very disheartening opinion, and while it might not be true, its existence alone dictates that there is some element of truth to it. It's really a tough debate if you try to look at both sides of the issue. After all, it is a very technical competition for students, why should the teams that have the most technically sophisticated machine be berated for their success? Obviously they have done the work to get where they are.

I personally don't really have an answer to this, I just think that something should be done to help keep new teams from feeling discouraged. As a mentor, I view that it is my responsibility to my students to encourage them in their efforts at all times. As a veteran of 6 years, I am proud of FIRST and am always happy to talk about its benefits to students to other co/pending sponsors, mentors, other students, members of the community, anywhere really. If you look at the facts, FIRST is a fantastic opportunity for students, in many different fields, including science and technology. I would never want a team or person feel discouraged or depreciated because of a lack of technical/monetary/whatever resources, because that could deny a student their potential.

So I'm obviously being long-winded, and I'm sorry, but this is an important issue to me. So for those who accept it, I would challenge you and your teams (and my team as well, #2219) to go out of your way to encourage and foster teams. There are more than a few teams now who do a lot of things to help new teams, obviously 47 (this forum is sponsored by a team btw), 341, a ton of others. But there is always more that we can do.

[Jack Murphy]

rise up to theirs

That's the gist. Sean, really like your reasoning. Let us remember that we're sometimes dealing with...

These folks are the absolutely aweSOME future of this program.

[Frenchie]

It is always quite easy to infer that the team that just beat you is "mentor dominated".

Truth is, a mentor dominated team is usually a student abandoned team. Many times, the mentors are willing to teach but few students are willing to step up into leadership.

Also. Too often do I hear people that a team is "mentor dominated" without the slightest bit of evidence.

All I have to say is, if you find a great robot: sit down, enjoy the show and learn! Make sure you beat that team next year.

Who are you to decide how learning should take place? If you are into 100% student built robotics competitions, they exist (check out OCCRA).

Francois

[Donut]

Originally Posted by Frenchie

Truth is, a mentor dominated team is usually a student abandoned team. Many times, the mentors are willing to teach but few students are willing to step up into leadership.

This statement, I think, sums up well the truth of most teams where you rarely see a student working on the robot. And this is the reality on our team, which in the past 2 years has become one of those teams with almost no students in the pits, so I'll use us as an example of perhaps why you see this happening.

I was a student on our team from 2004-2007, and this year was my first year mentoring on it. In my first years (04 & 05) the team had very strong student leadership and a pretty good amount of mentors involved (5 engineers with varying availability for each). The team built extremely competitive robots (we were top 8 seeds both years) and students on the team worked hard to gain more mentors and more sponsorship to help out for the future, so we'd be able to attend more competitions and try even more complex designs.
Then in 2006, the leadership graduated and a new set of students (myself included) stepped up to fill their shoes. But these students didn't have the dedication or the attitudes of the previous ones, and by the end of the year I was the only remaining member of that group of officers, as we found ourselves scrambling throughout the year to replace them as they one by one left the team. Since our team was primarily student led, the sudden shift in leadership quality meant alot of poorly trained new students and alot of time sitting around doing little. And this showed in our robot quality, as we performed much worse in qualifiers than before (going 3-5 if I remember correctly).
Now last year and this year our team has shifted to be more mentor run and the robot less student built. This is due to a combination of things. We now have more mentors (as a result of our efforts to recruit mentors years ago and students returning to mentor we have 15+ mentors), so automatically the mentors start to have more of an impact. Our school cut some of its tech classes (networking, drafting, and programming specifically), so there is less interest in the student body in technology. But mainly it is because the problems of 06 are still affecting us, not only because we are wary of making the team too student dependent should a similar situation occur again, but also because the new students we got that year learned from that leadership's good AND bad habits, and they still exhibit those habits today.

So our current team still has eager excited students, who put their heart and soul into the robot and making sure it gets done, but the majority of students don't put in as much effort as in the past. This has forced us to make mentors more involved to ensure the robot gets built and stays running. Yet this hasn't correlated with success; our 2 best performing robots were the ones built with our best student leadership. And this is because all mentors really do is ensure that you have a functioning robot; strategy, drivers, design, and scouting (key components to winning) can be enhanced by mentors but really require good students to come up with and implement them (I've noticed that engineer mentors actually tend to be really bad at driving advice ).

So next time you see a group of mentors huddled around a robot and no student in sight, don't be so quick to judge that the mentors are being over-bearing, and be glad that you have students on your team who are eager to do it themselves. It may be that they simply had to get involved to make sure that a robot was built, that all the eager students were in one area (maybe electrical) and no one wanted to do another portion (maybe programming). If you were a mentor, and you had the choice between building part of the robot yourself or no robot being built, which would you choose? Which inspires more, students watching as a robot is built, or students who show up with no bot at all?

[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by Depreciation

If the students of these said teams are learning a bunch from all this well great! that doesnt mean the way they are doing it is right

This is the exact flaw in your argument. Neither you nor I nor anyone else have any say in what is "right" for a team.

[Blue_Mist]

If you think not, does that mean you don't exist? (Sorry, couldn't resist. I'm in my sixth year of Latin and quod cognito, ergo sum!)

There's something special about seeing a robot or a team that inspires and depresses at the same time. Inspires for the obvious "Oh my goodness that is so awesome" and depresses for the "Our robot isn't performing that well." Whether you choose to be raised to the incredible FIRST high of inspiration or plunged into despair is up to you.

And of course, those winning teams are clearly doing something right. Change your own behavior, see what your team would willingly change. As for the adult/student ratio, perhaps mentors simply know more than the students and are helping them learn? I know, it's a completely crazy idea here in FIRST. 'now dump sarcasm on the last two sentences' Why isn't it Gracious and Professional for teams to be consistently good performers? Ask how they do what they do. Request their help, get to know their team and you would every other team at a competition.

Here ends my thoughts. A semi-rant? Can something be a semi-rant?