We just recruited new rookie members for this season, but some members are also parts of a sport activity( which is very time consuming and interferes with FIRST build schedules and our general meetings). We have a merit system that determines the students status on the team; ex: proactive members gets rewarded and ghost members gets punishment like getting kicked off the team. However, as one of the captain, it will be unfair to the people in sport who don’t show up to meeting and gets demerits…so I would like to ask what do other teams handle these kind of people.
Imagine you were a captain on this other sport, and you found out some people were not attending well because they were on the robotics team? Is this your problem? Obviously if they don’t attend, they don’t get to play very much if at all, MUCH LESS being on the varsity team.
You can’t treat your FIRST team as a second-class activity. It is the varsity sport for the mind, and that’s more than just a catchphrase. Being on an FRC team demands ones time and energy just as much as any varsity sport. I’m sure that this other team has attendance rules, and it’s certainly fair for you to have them as well. I’m not advocating kicking these students off your team or any other course of action, but I think you’re looking at it from the wrong perspective.
Your system rewards people who are committed and show up. If some students can’t dedicate themselves to the team, they get demerits. This sounds like a self-correcting problem.
This is probably an over-cynical look at the problem. It may be good for someone to be on the team even in a reduced capacity. It would, depending on the person, be tough to become a driver without attending as much, for example.
I think it’s critical here to think about what the problem is and what a reasonable approach to fixing it is. Will being strict on attendance create a loyal core team or alienate people on the fence about getting involved? Can you afford to lose the people on the fence? Or will their use mentor support or other resources drag the team down?
In a situation like this, I think it is important to be firm but sympathetic. Encourage people to make their best effort to be involved even if it means that they don’t give robotics their 100%, especially fall or spring season athletes. Both of my teams have had very useful students who did sports during the offseason but gave robotics their full attention during build season. Those students should be commended, not condemned.
On 2791, we have a 40-hour requirement during build season to come to competitions with the team using team-arranged transportation, hotels, and (if needed) excused absences.
On 1257, we are a bit laxer. The more involved students are more privy to receiving responsibility, leadership roles, and travel subsidies for Champs. The less involved students are just… less involved.
In the end, it is important to determine whether you want to use a carrot or a stick to entice student involvement.
We’ve got a similar problem with band.
There’s a couple of things you can do.
–Set schedules for minimum interference with other activities.
–Pass the word around that while the team is open to everyone, you get out what you put in, AND the more you’re in the shop the more likely you are to go to any travel events (or other similar perks).
The fact you have a system that penalizes no-shows is a good thing, but… If I might make a suggestion, demerits should only be given for unexcused absences. By discussing absences in advance with the team’s leadership (hey, I have this other activity so I can’t be there on X Y and Z and I’ll be late), demerits can be avoided/limited.
Yes we have discussed the matter with unexcused absences, and we agree with your statement completely. However, some of the rookies that we personality know that WILL use their sport as an excuse to not show up to help; and we want to be indirect and hint to them that they can’t do that here, along with enforcing the rule to prevent slackers/‘intentional ghost members who just wants their resume to look good’ from joining/staying.
We’ve suffered from such tradegy last year and end up with only 7 veterans left from 30 applicants and we want to prevent that from happening again and after we graduate
Thank you very much. Our team has 6 captains and must of us would like to recommend this people to choose between FRC or their sport not both. Half of the captains are veterans with only 1 yr experience, so our merit/probation system and team manual was J ust enforced this year.
The factions between our debate is…
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Be easy on the ‘sport members’ and limit how much the merit system affects them. Ex: contribution at least once every 3 weeks(~1 month)
Con: these members will never become a true veteran and lack experience for next year; once seniors veterans graduate -
Be strict(my opinion) break the news to them and ask them not forcefully but seriously to choose between the two
Con: turn people away esp. People who wants to do STEM but also wants to play a sport in college or as professional -
Neither (my mentor’s idea) have them be a ‘support member’( forgot the official word)
-don’t have to show up to meeting
-minimal contribution
-not affected by merit system
Con: irresponsible and prob won’t allow them to go on competitions
Thank you very much. Our team has 6 captains and must of us would like to recommend this people to choose between FRC or their sport not both. Half of the captains are veterans with only 1 yr experience, so our merit/probation system and team manual was J ust enforced this year.
The factions between our debate is…
-
Be easy on the ‘sport members’ and limit how much the merit system affects them. Ex: contribution at least once every 3 weeks(~1 month)
Con: these members will never become a true veteran and lack experience for next year; once seniors veterans graduate -
Be strict(my opinion) break the news to them and ask them not forcefully but seriously to choose between the two
Con: turn people away esp. People who wants to do STEM but also wants to play a sport in college or as professional -
Neither (my mentor’s idea) have them be a ‘support member’( forgot the official word)
-don’t have to show up to meeting
-minimal contribution
-not affected by merit system
Con: irresponsible and prob won’t allow them to go on competitions
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There’s a couple of ways to handle that.
Question: Do you have a team handbook, or written set of team policies? If not, your homework is to develop one.
Anyways…
First, make it clear that all absences must be pre-approved*. “I’m on a sports team, so I have to miss all of the build days but can make it to competition” should not be pre-approved, just in case you’re wondering. “I have to miss 1 day a week due to sports” should be approved. You get the idea.
Second, make it clear (to school administration as well as to prospective members) that if anybody who has a severe attendance issue tries to put “robotics” on their application/resume, and that gets checked on, the answer should be “Oh, him? No, he wasn’t on the team–never showed up to any meetings.” Remove people from the rosters as necessary. (If someone gets called on something like that, it looks really bad to whoever’s checking.)
If you can work it right, those two between them should take care of the “doin’ it for the resume, don’t have to be here”.
*Or appropriately documented–if you’re in the ER getting emergency surgery before the meeting starts because you got hurt, bring at least some of your ER paperwork with you whenever you come back! Some things ARE more important than robotics!
One of the Team Moms of one of the other teams working out of the same facility was describing how she was interviewing a job applicant that claimed to be on an FRC team on his/her resume. That applicant only knew the team number but not the team name and could not describe the role they played on the team. Needless to say, that applicant was not hired. From how indignant she was, I think it was the dishonesty that made the applicant lose the job.
If the wannabe team members are going to drift away, you are probably better finding out sooner than later, say in the second week of the build season.
One of the greatest human fears is the fear of loss. The best way to get over that fear is to fire up your recruiting efforts now and replace the team members that you are confident are not able to commit to your team.
In Nick’s example, what would the Coach of that sports team be doing if they found out a bunch of the team members were more committed to your robotics team than their sports team?
If,despite your best efforts, you do end up with fewer students, then your goals will need to be more modest. I think Karthik had a Golden Rule about this.
I do not recommend kicking team members off the team only because the do not show up often enough. If they are not attending for good reasons and they actually try to contribute when they do attend, they should probably be allowed to do so. On a previous team, two of the best builders had to stop attending (fortunately not at the same time) because their school grades were starting to suffer. Some others lived 20-30 miles away and could not reliably get rides to the build site.
The team president and vice president of my current team only showed up 3-4 times during the build season and competition season. They were allowed to tryout for the drive team but ultimately the team members who came almost every time out performed them and were chosen.
Thank you for your response.
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Yes my department and our logistics department is working on a team manual. I would say the structure and policies are done(94%) I just need to finalize the merit-credit system and the deal with sports & jobs
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Yes our policies does include several rules about absents; in short
-truant(unexcused) absences will count against you
-Emergencies, absent from SCHOOL, etc will NOT count against you
-Still deciding on what to do with sports/jobs
-too many inactiveness and/or improper actions or lack of actions that violates with the ‘Probation Guidelines’ and ‘Rules and Policies’ will be punished correspondingly -
One of our other captains and our mentor requests us to finish the handbook and present next meeting/ASAP; so we will have to tell them to commit or quit it
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We have had conflicts with band, sports, cheerleader (including flag team, dance team, etc), and thespian activities going all the way back to our rookie year. One of the key goals of both the student founder (Gixxy) and the founding coach (JHobson) was to make the team cross any and all of the “class” boundaries in the school. While the line has moved back and forth over the years and in individual cases, we want overlap with these activities, but rarely do we allow those with serious conflicts during build season to be “officers” (team captains, department leaders or deputies). One of the notable exceptions was last year when our programming lead was also on the tennis team. (She also swam, but that was more of a fall committment.) We have had a number of football, basketball, and volleyball players over the years.
Bottom Line: We ensure that the responsibility each team member has is in line with his/her priorities.
Edit: We have always been clear that there is a difference between a “no-call-no-show” and a notified absence, even if it is for a reason that isn’t fully excused. If someone in a responsible position doesn’t show (whether excused, announced, or not), there is also credit/demerit given based on whether they had provided for their area of responsibility to carry on. In some cases it was just a deputy who was fully up-to-date and ready to take the reins, in others a last-minute dump of what was going on to other team leaders.
Thank you very much, this will become very useful info I believe
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One of our graduates was on the build team and volleyball, from what I’ve heard he was the most commendable person; after he finished his practice after 5pm, he would come to robotics and assist everyday, we are trying to find these people; and we would not count against them for lateness for their commendable actions, but that might be too much of an expectation.
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One of our captains was demoted because of her tight schedule for her job, but was hired at her job because her superior was a mentor for FRC and she was hired on the spot for trusting her past contributions (glad for her)
But we do feel regrets for losing a captain and a member in general (when we have a small team ever since last year)
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My team has about 13 people on the team, and more than 8 or 9 people play varsity sports. Football, swimming, baseball, soccer, volleyball, and wrestling.
Some of the people (such as myself) go to morning practices before school for sports, so that we can do robotics after school. Obviously this is only an option if your sport’s coaches offers morning practices, in our case only football and soccer offer morning practices.
Another drawback for this, is that you have to get up way early in the morning. During soccer season (which overlaps with build season) I get up at 4:30 in the morning to get to school by 5:15 for practice, and I don’t leave school until 7 pm (or later depending on the day) because of robots. And since homeworks are a thing, generally sleep around 1:30 am
Another thing you may look into doing, is having later practices a couple times a week. For example, on Tuesday’s and Thursdays during build we have robotics from 6:30 to 8:30 instead of 3:30 to 6:30, to accommodate those that have sports practices right after school
115, my old team, meets 6-9 on two days of the week to account for sports and mentors with jobs. This does mean you need to be open late but the benefits outweigh the costs for many.
1072 meets 1-2 days per week and we ask that people be able to give enough time for that. If you can’t meet even one day a week, how will you be able to meet during build season? Fall sports are a thing but training is a necessity.
Gonna add my two cents.
Our team meetings are 6-8:30. That’s Mon-Thur (and 9-4 on Sat). This avoids any conflicts for us with most* sports at our school, allowing mostly anyone to join without conflict. Plus this also helps mentors and parents who are working to join us more easily.
*Swimming (and hockey, I think?) practice at the nearby university and so their practices are late, making them the exception. Needless to say, I don’t think we have any swimmers/hockey players.
I think that this is a very interesting topic and is something that we’ve discussed on my team multiple times over the years. I’ve been a mentor on 708 for the last 10 seasons and assistant head mentor for the last 6 and not once have we forced a student to choose between robotics and another activity. And at least once a season we have a student presented with the awkward situation of being forced to only do one activity and in 7/10 of those situations they have picked robotics over the other activity. We find that having and accommodating atmosphere on the team makes it more welcoming to the students and puts a lot less pressure overall. We gave up taking attendance and logging hours years ago, it just wasn’t effective enough for in tracking productive time vs total time.
Also, in my experience, students that have multiple commitments (job, other school activities, non school activities, family commitments, etc.) tend to value their, the mentors, and the team’s time more than students only committed to robotics. They tend to be more driven and focused at the task at hand because they know the time they have to complete the task is limited, they are 100% committed in the time that they have. They also tend to be good leaders because they have been exposed to different coaching/leadership styles in the different activities they do. And in particular students with an athletic background tend to be more competitively driven (not a hard rule just my observation).
I think that this is a very interesting topic and is something that we’ve discussed on my team multiple times over the years. I’ve been a mentor on 708 for the last 10 seasons and assistant head mentor for the last 6 and not once have we forced a student to choose between robotics and another activity. And at least once a season we have a student presented with the awkward situation of being forced to only do one activity and in 7/10 of those situations they have picked robotics over the other activity. We find that having and accommodating atmosphere on the team makes it more welcoming to the students and puts a lot less pressure overall. We gave up taking attendance and logging hours years ago, it just wasn’t effective enough for in tracking productive time vs total time.
Also, in my experience, students that have multiple commitments (job, other school activities, non school activities, family commitments, etc.) tend to value their, the mentors, and the team’s time more than students only committed to robotics. They tend to be more driven and focused at the task at hand because they know the time they have to complete the task is limited, they are 100% committed in the time that they have. They also tend to be good leaders because they have been exposed to different coaching/leadership styles in the different activities they do. And in particular students with an athletic background tend to be more competitively driven (not a hard rule just my observation).
A lot of our team members are the same, they either have insane workloads at their charter schools or they have seasonal sports to attend. Our rule is that as long as you tell us why you aren’t able to show up to meetings, we don’t mind much. The problems come when students disappear for months on end without a word. We don’t have an official attendance requirement for off build meetings, but we do take note of who shows up and who doesn’t.
During build season meetings, we require 80% attendance at all meetings in order to go to competition. That number becomes more flexible to more off build seasons you come to, as well as the more you let us know about your schedule. This historically has weeded out people pretty well.
I would be careful with being strict about attendance on the offseason. Some of our most dedicated members have been a part of other school clubs such as marching band or TSA.
I would say to make decisions on a student by student basis. It’s pretty easy to tell what kids care about the team and those who don’t. The ones who communicate with you about their absences will usually be the ones who care. The ones who work hard and listen at meetings they go to are the ones that care about the team.
On a side note, I wish our team could kick people off of it. Certainly a useful tool, but I would recommend only using it in more extreme circumstances (behavioral issues etc.).
Good luck.
The most effective strategy in my (limited) experience has been to let students come and go as they please, and run very long daily meetings. If you do this, you will need several different mentors who can at the very least keep the meeting space legally open, even if they can’t contribute to the team at all (ex. a teacher at the school who doesn’t really understand FIRST at all but has some papers to grade). Have the teacher around to keep the administrators happy, but have college students or engineers actually run the shop. One mentor cannot be there all day every day if you run 6+ hour meetings all week. Don’t expect students to be there all the time either.
I would also highly recommend trying to keep your team members who are on sports teams. Having a homogeneous group of students on the team is very dangerous for a team’s longevity. Make sure people know that you can do both. People who choose to do multiple demanding activities are generally great to have around.
Tracking hours is a good first sort for finding top contributors, but it’s not perfect. Keep an eye out for people who do a lot in limited amounts of time, and recognize them appropriately. Make sure to get to know the people on the team, and know what they have going on. Pick a time around the middle of the meeting when almost everybody is there, and have a short meeting to check progress on the various tasks going on.
Finally, my ‘silver bullet’ for attendance problems: dinner at the ends of meetings. Get the team parents to each sign up for a day or two, ideally having dinner at every meeting. This works on everybody, but especially on people coming from a sports practice.
This model is great for dealing with students’ schedules, but requires a lot of mentors (or at least monitors) and makes keeping everyone on the same page and tracking the build schedule a lot harder. How do you reach the finish line if you don’t know where you are? A communications tool (slack, or even a bulletin board) and some “core” meeting times are all but necessary.