What is it about FIRST makes people bias it with Geeks? We are trying to get more people to join robotics this year (especially females). How can we break this geek-FIRST bias?
Why should we care? If someone’s so shallow as to let prejudice stunt their own growth, then who needs them; who needs them to pretend to stunt ours? 
I havent been offended by anyone calling me a geek for years now.
I really dont see what the big deal is…
haha half of my friends dont even know i’m on the team.
to break the prejudice, have a kid with a mohawk, or your class president join the team, and tell everyone how awesome it is. 
i’ve got both on my side 
Thanks Aaron for you suggestions.
We really need more people this year because 1/3 of the team are seniors. If we dont recruit and educate new people now, we will be facing a giant vacuum of members and skills.
One thing that would help is to open up registration to the team to the whole school and activly recruit all students. Not just honor roll. Other than that it’s really up to them. If they are so threatened by FIRST that all they see is stuck up geeks playing with expensive toys than thats their loss.
Don’t emphsize so much on robotics. Tell them about other things that your team does, especally trips. And I haven’t seen a bigger group of cool people then in comps.
Yeah but remeber back when FIRST was at Disney and teams reported problems with kids joining the teams just to travel to Disney and not really wanting anything to do with the robots? That isn’t good for FIRST niether. i think the best thing a team can do toi spread the word of FIRST is to show pictures and video of what the build process constitutes and also show that there is more to FIRST than just building the robot. You are also building the team and yourself. The robot is just a tool to accomplish that goal.
Proudly Wear bright ugly yellow hawaiian shirts and thou shalt not be called a geek
Ok in all seriousness, make a job list of the team and hand it out or something of that sort, include all possible jobs and let them find a suitable position for themselves on the team.
-B-RAT(As curry says)
Geek?!? I think you should take that as a compliment…that means you are going to be someone’s boss later on in life 
You are referring to Bill Gates Rule #11
I have to applaud you. But anyway, yeah, why even bother with the ‘Geek-FIRST’ Bias? Nerds and geeks are what we are, and even though things may look uneventful now, just wait. Gates did it, Jobs and Wozniack did it, we can do it! Be happy. 
Now for the question at hand. Just be open about what your team is, who you are, and what you do. That means announcing your adventures/victories over the PA or some other way, and making PR second nature. What I mean by that is to make sure that your team and its members are representing the team well, anytime. That can be done by members wearing the team shirt a certain day consistently, or some other way of showing that your team exists. Then you get people who may come to you or you may be talking to them and they say, “Hey, I used to work (or do work) at that plant,” or “I know robotics teams like that.”
I don’t think any one technique is going to help you recruit people. If you want to get a particular involved, talk to them, be friendly, and find out what they are interested in. That way, you don’t waste his or her time, and possibly turn them off to robotics. Try to think like he or she would, what would he or she find interesting?
Though by numbers, our team is largely people who volunteered without knowing much about our team, many of the key and most active members were personally recruited.
Our team has been trying from the beginning to get a reputation for robotics above that of “geek”, but we’re still trying. A large part of this is because we get no support from the school. The one year they did support us, we got plenty of interest, but it’s only been decilining ever since. We currently have about seven dedicated members on our team, because people either don’t know we exist, or they assume that our club isn’t cool. If you go to a jock school, this is definately the case. I mean, seriously, FIRST robotics is mainly like a sporting event, only with robots doing the labor instead of people. Yet we get no support, while the administation are always encouraging everyone to go support the athletes. I think support is mainly what makes and breaks a team.
As far as getting females involved, the Firebirds are an all-female team, since we go to an all-girls school. I’d say focus on financial, personal, artistic, and social aspects of the team when trying to get them involoved. That’s what new people usually want to start out with for us, until they get into it at least.
I don’s think you should be telling people that FIRST isn’t for geeks. I think you should convince people to embrace their inner geek!
::ends the post before it sounds like a monologue from Revenge of the Nerds::
Well, I’d have to agree 100%…but unfortunately, that would rid ourselves of half the people we manage to scrape up on our team…so I guess we’ll just have to lead the cool nerd party on our own…
I honestly don’t find it to be attracting only geeks.
I’m not even close to being a geek, really. I’m more of an outgoing business person with serious PR skills. As many people may have found out.
But really, FIRST attracts all kinds of people; nerds, geeks, dorks, preps, techies, PR people, financial persons, etc. It’s a wide range of people, and that’s the amazing thing people hardly recognize. FIRST attracts everyone. It appeals to so many different people.
What we need to let people know is that there’s something in FIRST for everyone. Not just engineering skills for geeks. There’s PR skills, financial skills, CAD skills, Animation, Website building, etc. The list is practically endless!
That’s the message we need to convey. FIRST can appeal to all. We just need to show that to them.
First of all, I just want to say that the Firebirds Rock!! We are looking forward to seeing you at Ramp Riot!
My advice is, just make your team fun. Dream up some school event or reason to demonstrate your machines. Sometimes our team will just practice in public areas of the school just to watch confused people scratch their heads. Kids will always come up and ask questions. Also be open to diverse groups of recruits and keep the faith. Everything else will follow.
As far as the stigma of geekdom goes, we laugh at people that laugh at our team. When people try to stereotype our team, we get in their face. We love our geeks, but we also recruit athletes, artists and business oriented people.
FIRST is NASCAR, FIRST is a Sport, FIRST is an adventure! I go crazy when anyone on our team calls it the Robotics “Club”. We are a TEAM!!!
I guess what I am saying is get some attitude. What you are doing is amazing! We have grown through word of mouth. Friends recruit friends. It is amazing how far a little attitude goes.
In terms of female recruiting, we are about 40% female. We have strong female role models, both in terms of mentors and students. Nothing makes a student want to join more than seeing someone like themselves being successful and supported.
Exactly. Each FIRST team is like a mini corporation, and it needs people and trains people for all walks of life. I’m sure that if it was mandatory for freshman at schools that the teams would be huge, with some schools requiring more than one team. The problem is getting kids to committ the time necessary and the interest.
definetly do not promote robotics based on the trips and such. at least half of our team doesnt do squat, and ends up getting into trouble at the competitions.
To recruit people, use word of mouth, and show off the bot. We put ours in the school cafeteria and show it off, it actually helped out a lot. also, try showing them how it was built, lots of kids think it is really cool using the tools in a machine shop and such. A lego team would also probably help out a lot with kids coming into the school.
Honor roll? What team follows that rule? I think that 818 has a minimum GPA requirement, but I’ve never heard of it being enforced…
I go to a magnet school for math and science classes. We refer to ourselves as geeks all the time. Who says that being a “geek” is a bad thing? 