I am making a slide show to show at our school to try to get more kids to join. we have had 4 really dedicated people on our team for the last four years (next year will be our 5th year) and all of our dedicated people are graduating. I am trying to get more people interested and maybe we’ll get a few new dedicated people. What I am wondering is what should I put in the slide show? What should all be mentioned. I was thinking a little background on our team, what FIRST is, and stuff like that. Any other suggestions?
Scholarships. Students might not care too much, but parents will. Make sure to mention some of the “local” universities that offer them.
Pictures of the team having fun. Nobody’s going to join if it isn’t at least somewhat fun. Also avoid pictures of anything that is perceived as overly nerdy/dorky/geeky, as that could scare potential students away. (The team itself doesn’t count; the other students at the school should be well used to that by now.)
Great Ideas! I’ll look around and see what pictures I have here. I will be sure to add the scholarships in as well even though this will be shown to only students. some of our older students might pay attention to that.
Don’t spend too much time talking about first. I would show them some of these videos:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ex90Aw4PdAI
http://www.youtube.com/user/FIRSTWorldTube#p/c/F952898665788873/3/biOfnBxuW84
This is my favorite video so far.Tell them this is the field where the Atlanta Falcons play.
http://www.youtube.com/user/FIRSTWorldTube#p/c/3B1C4E0C4756E728/3/f8SDJTUTKUE
Also, show them some TBA videos of awesome matches. Any one with 469 would be perfect to show how the game can be manipulated extremely well!
I hope some of these help. With a custom video that we made last year, we received 15 new kids this year (on a team of around 35). We believe that the video was a big contributing factor. We showed it at the middle school to all of the 8th graders that would be in the high school the next year.
Make a list of accomplishments that show the successes of your team. It’s not bragging. People like to join winning teams. Besides the obvious, this also strips away the “club” mentality. You don’t “win” things in clubs; kids know this.
Good Luck
What really attracted me to robotics was the fact that you are making robots. I mean how many 15 year olds out there are making robots? I think it should emphasize the building as fun not a job.
Travel. Nothing motivates people to join like the promise of a trip to far-away lands of regional/championship competition during school days 
Also, give an idea of the vast scale of an FRC competition. People on the outside don’t realize that its like a sporting event, a lot imagine something more like a science fair with judges coming around to look at your booth.
FIRST has slide shows on their Marketing Tools page that you can download and edit. You can take individual slides from them as well to use in yours, sucha s the slides giving the background of FIRST or quotes from Dean.
http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/resourcecenter.aspx?id=638
Use prezi, here is an example
http://falconroboticsteam842.org/Test.aspx
I have used prezi on a few occasions, and it is a very interesting idea! I love that one on your website! Its nicely laid out and is very appealing to the eyes.
Thanks for all the input! I presented it today and it seemed like it went well.
What exactly did you present? Just a slideshow you made? Or other various things?
A slide show and our robot from last year. I got a lot of complements from people, so I’d call it a success. We also had people sign up to join the team.
Awesome! I am glad to hear it was a success!