Member numbers won’t really help, unless you find a way to do the process in a way that does not allow the evaluators to know whom they are evaluating. As attitude is more important than aptitude for us, our evaluation involves reading body language and listening to tension in the voice, so there will certainly be enough info for the evaluators to identify familiar individuals. (I regularly identify individuals out of sight by voice. I have even ID’d people based on a sneeze.) We do, however, have different people working each station, so that one or two artificially high or low votes for an individual are unlikely to have a major impact on who is selected. Last year, we did cuts based not on a pre-determined number of students, but on “natural breaks” in the scores, and that is also the intention this year. The important thing is to have each challenged judged consistently (preferably only one or two judges), but to have the different tasks judged by different people to dilute any favoritism.
Having done a bit of judging at FLL tournaments, there is definitely no effort to “anonymize” the numbers. The numbers are used to help sort out those who are worth considering for each award; the individual selections are often based on back-and-forth witness and discussions among the judges. Tryout selection is similar; marginal scores will be adjusted up or down a bit based on what the judges observed. And oh, yes, I have done the same thing when I have made or influenced hiring decisions, both at work and for my church. In the case of FRC, it’s also necessary to remember that
However, if you take on a “project member”, make sure that you don’t take on more than your mentors and coaches can handle while still keeping the team moving along well.