This year, construction on my school caused a late start, and as a result, final are right in the middle of build season. Has anyone else had to do this, and if so, how did you cope?
Congratulations on the guilt free break from build season. 
It is simple really, you cope by doing your finals. Remember, school >>>>>>>>robots.
As a teacher I 100% ± 2% agree with this. Our finals are the week of Jan 23 :mad:
Have study sessions off to the side of your “build” area. Invite non-robotics kids to study with robotics kids, so they can see what’s going on.
Our semester exams are the same week as yours, we simply take that week off from during the week meetings. The goal is to work hard the first two weeks to design and prototype so we can order anything we don’t have on a shelf to be here after exams are completed.
We have midterms this week as well. During this week, we have shortened meetings, and only go until 6:30 until the normal 9 or 10 o’clock. We also only require members to go for 2 days that week, instead of the usual 3. By just going Friday after exams are over and on Saturday satisfy this. We want to make sure that students put school first, and are able to maintain their grades throughout the year.
We never had finals fall during build season, although for major tests we would all come and study together for them. Heck any time someone is having trouble with homework we tell them to bring it. Between the coach who is a science teacher, the students who have previously taken the class, and another mentor and myself(who were in their shoes 3 years ago) we normally are able to help them.
I always had finals at the end of January as well. We still had meetings, but made it clear that if you had a final that you really needed to study for, that took priority. There was definitely a drop in participation for that week. It helped that we had half days of school all week.
Our team had to deal with this every year until they moved first semester finals to before Christmas. I used to tell the kids that they had to be good with time management. We would work shorter hours the weekend before finals week and always take the day before the first final off. They would get the rest of the days off when they were taking a final, but the afternoon after their last final, we got back to work. I told them that if they needed to take extra time off to get ready for their exams, they should do so. The robot and the team will always be there after the one week of finals, and we can always catch up if we have to. You cannot make up for doing poorly on your final exams because you spent too much time on the robot when you should have been studying.
We always have finals during build season, but fortunately it’s the second week of build. We push hard the first week to figure out where we’re going and to get prototypes started, then the second week tends to be a little lighter as people decide if they can afford the time for robotics or need to study more for finals. This ends up being a slower week, but we can use it to finalize prototypes and order parts that wouldn’t get in until the next week. And it gives us 4 weeks at the beginning of the next semester to work hard on the robot… and lets face it, the first few weeks of a semester are always the easiest in school 
In 2008 my team met every day of the week and most of Saturday and Sunday to build this robot. We were a reasonably competive team and were picked at the bottom of the first round at a fairly deep regional.
In 2009 our head mentors were unable to commit as much time, one had moved up the chain at his day job and the other had burned himself out working round the clock the previous year. So we made a conscious choice to meet only 3 days and week, and not Saturdays until after Week 3, and hopefully not Sundays at all. We stuck to that schedule (ultimately meeting about half as much as we did the previous season), built this robotand were still picked at the bottom of the first round at the same fairly deep regional.
Work expands to fill the available time. :rolleyes:
Our finals week is when we work the hardest! Because school is in session for shorter hours, we have more time to work on the bot!
On the other hand, we’re also all insane at Stuyvesant H.S. I hate my high school.
Try not to get worked up about it, though. If you’ve been keeping up with school all year and doing your studying and homework, there shouldn’t be a need to cram last minute for your final. You learned the stuff, and it should be easy enough to prove it, right? :rolleyes: Just do your best. Good luck!
I was also going to mention something along these lines. We had finals in January in my first year, and I honestly don’t remember just what our schedule was. But if we were to have January finals again, I’d probably delete one, maybe two meetings right before finals and stress to the students that the remaining meetings prior to finals are optional and that getting decent grades has to come first. But I’d still have meetings, and we’d take advantage of the shorter hours, too, particularly on the last two nights when most of the studying should be done with.
Along the lines of what Phyrxes said, I think I’d also plan our design process around the final exam week to make sure we know what parts to order early enough to place orders as finals are starting. Then it’s not particularly painful to wait a few days for the parts to arrive.
Our school hasn’t had an issue with the finals interrupting build season because we have fall finals (coming up in a week and a half) but our students do have many tests during the season. During the afternoon sessions, we typically form study groups and get help from our mentors and higher level students.
Our school has optional finals unless you are absent or failing. The robot workspace is usually open all day over 2 days of finals (supervised of course) for building.
We have finals smack in the middle of build season, so as a result we don’t have any team meetings that week. However finals week also means 4 days of 12:30 dismissal, so small groups of our team, such as CAD or team leads, often meet at someone’s house.
Our finals always fall during the second or third weeks of the season. We usually see few or no freshman that week, as it is often the first time they have finals, so they aren’t sure what to expect. On the other hand, the more dedicated veterans continue to show up and work, taking advantage of the half days and no homework that come with finals week. However, the more dedicated members also happen to be the students who don’t really need to study for finals, which ends up working quite nicely.
Our finals are in the middle of build season every year. School is important, so we make sure students take the time to study and complete their school work. We have half school days during the testing week and still run full robotics meetings, so use the time between to study! That may be the one week you don’t show up to every robotics meeting, grades are a must!
our team continuous to work through finals (week 2 of build season). However, it is stressed during this week that school>robotics. Throughout the season, students are allowed to sit off to the side and do homework.
In Michigan and much of the midwest, finals are ALWAYS in the middle of build season. We’re used to it. Our team still holds build meetings, but we don’t count anything against students who don’t attend during finals week.