CT Teams - What does your school system provide your team

FIRST General Forum
1

CT Teams -

What resources does your school system provide for your team. (Example - transportation to events (school bus/coach bus) facilities, shop classroom, practice field - faculty, etc.

2

Hey Wendy,

I’ll give you a quick overview of what we’re given/not given.

What we GET:

  1. Our primary sponsor is the Board of Education. They pay our initial entrance fee.
  2. Use of a wood shop to build our robot, including:
    • Use of the wood working and hand tools
    • Allowing us to get our Lathe and Bridgeport electrically wired
    • Use of the Compressed Air system
    • Heat (for the CT winters)
    • Keys to the room
    • A locked storage area within the woodshop (8’ by 15’)
    • A “Long term storage” area
  3. Temporary use of the rest of the school
    • A classroom w/ computers for website developement, CAD, Office Documents
    • A carpeted room
    • The gymnasium
    • Hallways, Stage, etc…
  4. The teachers receive a stipend for being an advisor the team. The stipend is on par with club advisors, but below what a sporting team coach receives.
  5. A team page and picture in the Yearbook

What we DON’T GET:

  1. Woodshop supplies
    • Replacement Blades, Drill bits, sandpaper, material, etc…
  2. Transportation or general Travel Expenses
  3. Free use of the Kitchen for Fundraising Events (pasta dinners, pancake breakfasts, etc…)
  4. Varsity letters, a trophy display case, hung banners in the gym
  5. Website hosting

I’m sure there are more perks, as well as drawbacks, that I’ve forgotten. But, those are the biggies. Let me know if you need more information about a specific item.

BEN

3

Looks good Ben

We are also doing okay

Our primary sponsor is Hamilton Sundstrand, so they help with event fees.

The schools provide a metals shop, a location for the scrimmage, some travel expenses for buses to Hartford and a nearish regional (not enough to pay our way to Toronto, but a big help). And One of the schools provides stipends for teacher advisors.

4

wow I wish we had all of that. Our school gives us almost nothing. We met in our one teacher sponsor’s classroom for the first 3 weeks of build, after which we were fortunate enough to get a large warehouse from a research facility nearby. The school hasn’t given us anything though. We are completely on our own for funding, transportation costs, hotels, etc. If we make it to the championship, our chances of being able to afford it are not looking good right now.

5

What we get

  • A bank account
  • A room to use after school thats also used for 5 classes

What we dont get

  • Transportation
  • Money
  • Mentors/Teachers
  • etc…
6

We got almost nothing for five years. FIRST is not an easy fit with the usual things school’s support.

7