Lessons Learned From Being A Rookie First Robotics Competition Mentor

During this academic school year, I served as the organizing mentor for the First Robotics Competition Team at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria Virginia (Team #5587).

When I decided to become the organizing mentor for my local high school team, I didn’t know much about robotics, the competition, or any of the students who might join the team. I talked to some teachers and supporters at the school and in the community, put up some flyers and crossed fingers that we would get a team up and running and make to the competition.

I was moved to organize the team for a variety of reasons – a longstanding interest in STEM and a desire to help improve educational outcomes for kids on my community -- but primarily so that my children, who will go to T.C. Williams in a couple of years, will have a successful team in place should they choose to pursue this program.

When the season concluded, the Titan Robotics team had far exceeded my expectations during the Washington, DC regional competition. The season was certainly more challenging than I had expected. But, the sense of accomplishment and my deep pride in the team’s efforts made up for it.

If you are considering starting a FRC team during the 2015-2016 school year – I strongly encourage you to do so. I would like to share a few lessons from my rookie season experience that might make your experience a bit easier. These lessons are my own and do not reflect the team as a whole.

1. People in The FRC Community Are Authentically Helpful. 

FRC is a volunteer-driven organization. The folks who make this competition happen are just like you, and they want to help you and your team succeed. The competition itself is extremely collaborative among mentors and teams, and this spirit is reflected in the people you will encounter along the way. Ask for help, accept help, and offer help. I admit to a certain reluctance to accept outside assistance initially because FRC is a competition – but I was wrong.

2. Finding Build and Practice Space Was A Big Challenge.

The tools, equipment and amount of space required for designing and building a first class robot is formidable. The school did not have room available. And this is not a project to launch in your garage (unless your garage is part of a General Motors plant). Fortunately, we had a TechShop in the area willing to become a sponsor and let us use space on the weekends. But, the temporary nature of our location meant we were not as organized as we should have been.

3. Recruit Team Members Who Are Interested In Business and Marketing.

There are financial resources out there to support your team – and it will take some serious money to register, buy supplies, rent space etc. The FRC program is well known and local sponsors will help – working with students to find sponsors and execute a marketing plan is not that difficult, and can make or break your team’s ability to compete. Find a mentor with an interest in business and marketing, and make sure that team members who work on this aspect are valued and coached in a serious way.

4. Programmers Alone Do Not Make A Robot Competitive.

I recall the first meeting with the students – where most felt comfortable talking about programming languages but no one had worked with metal. We spent resources giving some of our team members metal working skills and we spent time getting many comfortable with power tools. There are strategists, builders, engineers, and drivers involved. And they will make the difference for your team.

5. Recruit Enthusiastic Mentors.

The timeline for the competition is short and intense, and these are high school students. Adults with patience, skills and a knack for working with teenagers are critical. The more the merrier.   We primarily practiced on weekends to make sure that we could get mentors from the community. 

6. Help Team Develop Decision-Making Skills Before Build Begins.

The build period and the competition itself are stressful. And the team needs to function as a team. As mentors, we need to students develop the skills to work together and develop a system for making decisions (hint: consensus is not the most efficient . . . . ). During the preseason, we should have developed specific rules for decision-making and resolving conflicts.

7. Make Sure Team Members Know Competition Rules.

Like any competition, FRC has rules. We did not adequately insure that all team members shared an understanding of the objectives of the competition and the relevant rules before we developed a strategy. As a result, we wasted a lot of time during the build period. I am considering that next season we will have a rules test just to make sure everyone is on the same page.

8. Strategy Actually Matters But Not Easy To Develop.

The teams who did consistently well in the competition had a solid strategy for each and every match that was well understood by their entire team. We left a lot to driver discretion. Next year … we will work on developing a clear strategy earlier in the competition.

9. Don’t Worry That It Is Too Late To Get Started.

For some teams, FRC is a year round activity. It took me awhile to appreciate that it took them years to get to that level of commitment and enthusiasm. We started mid-Fall and we did well.

10.  It's About The Students

We mentors decided early on that ours would be a student led team.  Sure it was frustrating at points in time.  But ultimately it is about the student's learning -- not whether the team won or lost.  We plan to build on that tradition.

Interested? Go check out the First Robotics website https://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc or send me a note. I’d be happy to help.