Are you able to get to work on your robot while teachers are voicing their concerns in Madison? or are you locked out? Are non-teaching mentors able to step up to help you work on your robot and meet your other team goals? or are they locked out too? Not all school districts are closed but some pretty big ones are…I would be curious to hear from teams who lost time from their build season…
BC
It’s definitely affecting our school. From what my sub first hour told me, 30 teachers gone and 20 subs short, but my friend told me we were 30 subs short. I was extremely surprised school wasn’t canceled. Today’s supposed to be our open house too. Most of our teacher-mentors are actually from the engineering charter school I’m in that’s inside the school. AFAIK, all of the charter school’s teachers are here so hopefully the strike won’t affect us too much. (This is the Appleton school district.)
The protests haven’t hurt our team at all in terms of building the robot. Other things like missed awards submissions will take time to determine. School’s been canceled yesterday, today, and tomorrow, but we don’t have our build site in our school. We’ve actually been able to start our meetings an hour early. We’d probably be meeting longer, but since most of the team’s parents are being affected, most of the students are protesting, in addition to the teachers/state workers who are our mentors.
I cant speak to how it is affecting teams, but I can say that it is crazy in Madison. Every once and a while I can hear people chanting from the capitol while I’m in my room.
I know, it’s crazy down there. I’d say that half of the high schoolers in the city were at the capitol at some point this week. (Could be a gross exaggeration, but I’ll run with it.) When I went to a team meeting last night, almost every person there was wearing red.
The strike has spread to Milwaukee Public Schools today…The school board has canceled classes…I suspect that will effect at least four teams who wont be able to get into locked schools. Hopefully things will settle down so they can at least get what they have done ready to ship…
BC
Does anyone think there is a chance highly affected schools will be allowed exceptions by FIRST if they can’t even get in the building to remove the robot and ship it?
I think any other team would be ok with this.
I could definitely see FIRST working with the teams to get the robots shipped, even if it was late due to schools being locked down from the strike. However, you almost certainly won’t see FIRST extending the build season for those teams.
It’s a horrible situation when politics gets in the way of real educational experiences.
After reading a bit about what is going on in Wisconsin, I’d suggest that what is taking place there is very much a real educational experience for anyone who wants to think critically and place the events in the context of the development of the economy and human rights in a democracies.
Indeed this is not a simple “teachers strike” about salaries or benefits, but rather a challenge and response to collective bargaining itself, which is considered by the United Nations to be a fundamental human right.
So yes, it is a horrible situation in Wisconsin, but the big picture is a bit bigger than an FRC tournament… as important as that may be to individuals.
Jason
MPS was shut down today so no meeting for us tonight. We’ve been confirmed that we’ll have access tomorrow and Monday was a scheduled holiday anyway, so the full day meeting for Monday should be unaffected. The question is: will FedEx be able to get into the building on Tuesday to pick up our crate…
If you are concerned about this then you need to contact your FIRST Region Director who can then contact FIRST on your behalf. They will probably require you to submit proof that the robot is in fact crated and that all hands are off (in effect it would turn your robot into a ‘bag-n-tag’ type of deal).
I wish you all the best…
Collective bargaining a fundamental human right??? Wow …you really are a teacher…
Not in so many words, but I’m sure it’s in there … probably in Article 23(4) “Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.”, right below 23(1) “Everyone has the right to work…” and the minefield of 23(3). ::rtm:: 
But there is always 29(1), which Spiderman said best, and I always tell my programmers: “With great power there must come great responsibility.”
More to the point – lets keep politics out of Chief Delphi.
Good luck to everyone in Wisconsin getting through this.
Jason:
I had respected your opinion from previous posts. After reading this, you also have my admiration. Thank You.