Team Phoenix

Mentor / Volunteer Agreement

Please read this agreement in full. Every mentor and volunteer initials the Mentor Responsibilities and signs during registration, and a hard copy is kept for the team’s records.

Team Purpose and Benefits

Combines engineering, programming, fundraising, and marketing in a competitive environment
Develops teamwork, leadership, communication, and problem-solving skills
Provides real-world experience with STEM professionals and access to over $50 million in FIRST scholarships
Fosters lifelong friendships and team bonding
Our primary team goal is education and growth. Winning competitions is a nice outcome but not our priority.

Questions

Questions about this agreement or about mentoring with the team? Email info@team2342.org.

General Responsibilities

Act as ambassadors for FIRST, the team, and 4-H with Gracious Professionalism
Maintain respectful behavior, follow safety protocols, and avoid distractions
No bullying, gossip, or disrespectful behavior
Uphold professional standards, representing FIRST, the school, and sponsors
Adhere to facility rules at the team’s meeting space
Keep up to date with FIRST and 4-H mentor / adult-volunteer policies

Team Phoenix Mentor Mindset, Responsibilities & Limitations

Mindset

Mentors on this team take a different approach than those on mentor-driven teams:

Our mission is “Enriching the lives of youth through robotics.”
We are “student-led, mentor-guided.” Mentors figure out where to set the guard rails. Many responsibilities go to students; some go to mentors.
We give students as much autonomy as they can handle. Giving student leads more autonomy than they can handle leads to a less-enriching experience for less-experienced students, which is counter to our mission.
After a period of more (or less) autonomy, we look back at how students used it and whether the change was a net benefit or loss for the mission.
As much as possible, we coach by asking questions and getting students to think.
Our rewards come from seeing students make breakthroughs, not making them ourselves.
We recognize that students will make social, technical, and other mistakes, and that they do not have years of engineering or leadership experience.
Building and funding a robot are means to the end of enriching students’ lives.
Going to the World Championship is a great outcome of dedication and hard work, but it is not our primary mission.

Responsibilities

Set good examples: professional language and tone, team-oriented thinking, constantly looking for ways to engage students, punctuality, and doing what you say you will do.
Polite, precise, timely communication.
Cultivate and defend a highly functional learning environment — deal with bullying, cliques, and attitudes that undermine students’ experience; fix issues yourself when you can and always let both Lead Mentors know.
Follow FIRST’s Gracious Professionalism.
Recognize your limits when tired or frustrated: ask for help, minimize disruption, take a break to regain composure.
Look out for the physical safety of all team members — good shop and safety-glasses practices, auto-code-testing practices, cancelling meetings for bad weather, and FIRST’s Youth Protection Policy.
Help student leads engage and include all their sub-team members; support non-leads to support the lead.
Offer guidance from your experience — soft skills (conflict resolution, rapport, balancing efficiency with politeness), technical skills by sub-team, and logistics / scheduling.
Hold student leads accountable. Work with an underperforming lead to improve; if the impact on other students is severe, work with students to fill the role differently.
Purchase items and services that students request, within reason.
Exercise veto authority on decisions that affect the team on a multi-year timescale (for example, spending far more than the team has fundraised in a season).
A limited set of mentors handle bank access, monthly transactions, categorization, and receipts to keep the team in legal standing with 4-H and its banks; students may assist.
Coordinate parent / workplace sponsorship and matching donations so all non-profit information is accurate and transactions are tracked to completion.
Set up the budget structure and help student leads forecast and track income and expenses.
Help students find and contact sponsors and grants; students write the applications and communicate with sponsors as much as possible.
With student input, set the structure of student elections so they are fair.
Run a formal leadership-training program each year, ideally in summer.
Teach students how to talk to judges and give feedback to improve their presentation and speaking skills.
Hold each other accountable. Mentors who reject the team’s operating philosophy may be removed by the Lead Mentors, especially when their actions undermine the mission and reminders do not improve behavior.

Limitations

Mentors do not yell at students or other members of the team.
Mentors do not favor one student over another.
Mentors do not make decisions regarding the robot — the students do.
Mentors do not push their ideas on students for student-domain decisions, especially repeatedly.
Mentors do not do work that students could be doing. Outsourcing work the team has no machines for (belly pans, deck plates, welding) is fine; so is building field pieces when the team is short-handed or under a time crunch so students can test the robot.
Minor incidental help (for example deburring) is okay on the rare occasions unoccupied students are not available.
Mentors do not design parts or assemblies, fabricate or assemble parts, write code, design or execute tests for students, drive the robot instead of students, or do maintenance on the robot (anywhere, especially in the pits).
Mentors do not choose the fundraisers the team runs (Head Mentors have veto power over location or public image) and do not lead fundraiser coordination — they assist or help when a student asks, and guide with questions. Monetary collections and financial guidance are handled by mentors.
Mentors do not compile or write award materials (binders, essays, videos, scripts). Reviewing and editing is acceptable.
Exceptions can be made when a student specifically asks for help (for example, a student lacks the hand strength for a task). If there are not enough students to do the work, find students or consult other mentors.

Qualities we look for in mentors

Green flags:

Patience and kindness
Willingness to see the good in students who are challenging, and to meet students where they are in skills and development
Finds their rewards in seeing students solve problems and get the a-ha moments
Asks more than tells; willing to teach and guide students to gain skills

Red flags:

Opinions frequently counter to the team culture
Seeming intent to further a personal agenda to change team culture
Seeming intent to mentor in favor of their own child
Not backing down and repeatedly pushing an idea after it is not accepted or implemented

Lead Mentors — in addition to the above, we look for:

Skilled in conflict resolution
Skilled in delegation — Lead Mentors guide the long-term trajectory of the team but can and should get help from other mentors
Able and willing to commit the time to accomplish the work the team needs
Ideally filled when other mentors recognize a person’s demonstrated commitment and aptitude, not when someone with minimal experience volunteers