members.html - frc971/website GitHub Wiki

The team Presidents work to keep the team running, which includes running fundraising, recruitment, and organizing team events.

The Vice-President supports the Presidents in team organization while learning the duties of President, like fundraising and recruitment. He is also in charge of maintaining content on the website and writing award submissions such as Chairman's.

The team captain is in charge of leading the design and construction of the robot and fielding the robot and drive team at competitions.  The captain is also in charge of making sure that new members are brought up to speed and all other technical aspects of the team.

The Treasurer is in charge of team funds and is responsible for keeping track of the balance and running spending and reimbursements.

The Secretary takes notes at every meeting and is responsible for managing publicity and team communication.  The secratary also works with the captain and president on part documentation.

People discussed goals for the season, many of which included improvements on things we have had trouble on in the past.  Many of the goals related to the desire to have 2 high quality robots done before ship day.

The main issues that we addressed were the questions over Who has ultimate authority, what is the role of mentors and what happens when deadlines get missed.

About who has authority, it was decided that the captain was the final say in all technical decisions during build season and the competition.  This does not mean the captain makes all the decisions, but has ultimate authority.  Safety decisions however, rest with the adult mentors.

As for mentors, we have talked about this before, and we always vaguely put ourselves somewhere in the middle.  We decided this time that instead of theoretical, in practice what it would look like.  We agreed that we wanted mentor involvement to continue to encourage students to learn at a high level, instead of students figuring things out with trial and error.

In the aspect of what to be done when deadlines get missed, we first decided that we plan on having a visible master schedule and have project leaders and the captain set clear deadlines of what needs to get done when.  After that, it is the responsibility of both the management and the person working on the project to communicate effectively so resources are allotted as necessary to finish the job. This allows management to be in a constant state of evaluating how things are going to better meet the overall build schedule and manage tasks that are both non reliant and reliant on other aspects of build.

One thing to make clear is that if a deadline has passed and someone else works on a project to make sure we meet a deadline or to finish something, it does not mean that the original person working on it failed.  The team understands that things happen, and something may not get done.  The best thing to do when you don't think you will be able to meet a deadline is the notify someone before the deadline so something can be done about it.  Regardless, just as a recommendation, do not get too attached to a project, since even if it is completed on time, it will most likely go through several iterations before going on the robot, or may not go on the robot at all depending on how the design evolves.

As an end note, we discussed meeting times, and we decided that it would be advantageous to have one evening meeting in the middle of the week so mentors can help.  We tentatively decided on Tuesday evenings for these meetings, so Tuesdays we would meet after dinner instead of after school.

The team captain is in charge of making sure that there is a robot built and that new members are brought up to speed. Scott joined the team in 2009 and leads the designing, fabrication, and assembly of the robots.  The captain also keeps contanct with materials sponsors for building the robot.

The team Presidents work to keep the team running, which includes running fundraising, recruitment, and organizing team events. Jai and Izzie joined the team in 2008. They manages the team’s finances, work with sponsors, register for competitions, organize community outreach, and work with Jonathan to maintain the website.

The Vice-Presidents support the Presidents in team organization while learning the duties of President, like fundraising and recruitment. They are also in charge of maintaining content on the website and writing award submissions such as Chairman's. Charlotte and Teresa joined the team in 2009.

The Secretary takes notes at every meeting and is responsible for managing publicity and team communication.  The secratary also works with the captain and president on part documentation.  Nick has been a part of Spartan Robotics since the summer of 2009.

The Treasurer is in charge of team funds and is responsible for keeping track of the balance and running spending and reimbursements.  Kevin has been a team member since summer 2009.

Jonathan installed Drupal, developed a Drupal module for viewing Google Picasa Web albums in PHP, created an extremely high-performance photo viewer with jQuery, and wrote automated quizzing software (used to administer the safety test).

In addition to the above:
Alex, Alice, Audrey, Benjamin, Brandon, Brian, Charlie, Chaz, Dishaan, Fernando, Jack, James, Jonathan, Maxwell, Melika, Michael, Nick, Parker, Ryan, Steven, Teresa