Involving Underclassmates

[cvargas]

Hello all,

I've been thinking about how to involved sophomore and freshman engineering class mates who don't have any design experience or car experience. I don't want to just relegate them to okay go write up our cost reports, proof reading, etc... I'd like to have them involved in the design portion but because they lack some of the key classes, like statics dynamics mechanics of materials etc... I'm a bit apprehensive to assign them anything serious.

I was thinking along the lines of having a big brother approach where one or two underclassmen are assigned to a junior or senior so they can shadow them and see what it takes and allow that junior or senior to assign them any duties.

Feedback?

[Drew Price]

I liked to keep a new member around while I was making things because of all the little habits that someone who is comfortable in a shop environment does second nature, but can seem very foreign or without reason to a new member - for example taking black oxide anti-rust coating off 4130 tubing with Scotchbrite or a wire wheel rather than with sand paper.

Or setting tooling on a towel on the mill bed, rather than directly on the mill table.

Or that you never ever ever ever set anything on the bed of a lathe.

Or that trying to sand something on a belt sander will go much smoother if you angle your part downwards, rather than up.

Files work much better if you set your part on something you can push against, like the edge of a work bench.....



It takes that sort of brotherly approach sometimes to get new members comfortable being around you, and you then have the opportunity to have conversations you may never have had, since enthusiastic new members will ask lots of questions when they are learning new things (the right kind of members at least).

Those kinds of experiences shaped my experience my first year, and stuck with me, I even try to pass some of that on to my new mechanics at work, and to my customers.

Drew

[RollingCamel]

May I ask what is your own status first? Is your team a new one or experienced?

[P. Jayaraman]

Definitely second Drew on this one. We've always found that a "big brother" type approach works best. Although younger students may have to be relegated to more menial construction tasks, it's through the techniques they learn with those that they learn how to tackle bigger challenges.

Another note about this subject is when to get them involved. We usually spend our first semester each school year designing and the second semester building. Trying to get underclassmen involved in that design semester usually proves to be very difficult and oftentimes impossible. This lack of things to do usually ends up driving away what could be excellent talent. That's why some of us are considering changing protocol so that underclassmen join the team in the build semester. They'll be much more involved and can learn about how we design in a more hands-on manner.

[cvargas]

Originally posted by RollingCamel:
May I ask what is your own status first? Is your team a new one or experienced?

We are a first year team.

[Kirk Feldkamp]

As someone that started a team from scratch, I don't think you can afford to NOT use whoever you can get. I found it was never hard to find people... it was hard to find good people. When you figure out who has real interest, and real skills to bring to the table, you just have to keep them in the loop (communication) and involved (responsible for stuff) with the project. If you make your deliverable expectations clear and someone fails to deliver, then don't be afraid to move around tasks until you find someone that can get the job done. After some trial and error, you will find a core group of people that are willing to put in the time to make things happen. Once you find that core group, hold on to them! In the early days, we had more than a few 1st and 2nd year kids get involved, most of which ended up becoming strong team leaders. A few years down the road the "buddy system" might make more sense, but it's a pretty bold assumption that the upperclassmen actually know what they're doing if you guys haven't done this sort of thing before!

-Kirk

[cvargas]

Originally posted by P. Jayaraman:
Definitely second Drew on this one. We've always found that a "big brother" type approach works best. Although younger students may have to be relegated to more menial construction tasks, it's through the techniques they learn with those that they learn how to tackle bigger challenges.

Another note about this subject is when to get them involved. We usually spend our first semester each school year designing and the second semester building. Trying to get underclassmen involved in that design semester usually proves to be very difficult and oftentimes impossible. This lack of things to do usually ends up driving away what could be excellent talent. That's why some of us are considering changing protocol so that underclassmen join the team in the build semester. They'll be much more involved and can learn about how we design in a more hands-on manner.

Very good points!

[cvargas]

Originally posted by Kirk Feldkamp:
As someone that started a team from scratch, I don't think you can afford to NOT use whoever you can get. I found it was never hard to find people... it was hard to find good people. When you figure out who has real interest, and real skills to bring to the table, you just have to keep them in the loop (communication) and involved (responsible for stuff) with the project. If you make your deliverable expectations clear and someone fails to deliver, then don't be afraid to move around tasks until you find someone that can get the job done. After some trial and error, you will find a core group of people that are willing to put in the time to make things happen. Once you find that core group, hold on to them! In the early days, we had more than a few 1st and 2nd year kids get involved, most of which ended up becoming strong team leaders. A few years down the road the "buddy system" might make more sense, but it's a pretty bold assumption that the upperclassmen actually know what they're doing if you guys haven't done this sort of thing before!

-Kirk

So right now just focus on getting a core group of students before worrying about involving under classmates in design?

[Kirk Feldkamp]

Originally posted by Santorican:
So right now just focus on getting a core group of students before worrying about involving under classmates in design?

Yup.

-Kirk

[moose]

Originally posted by Kirk Feldkamp:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Santorican:
So right now just focus on getting a core group of students before worrying about involving under classmates in design?

Yup.

-Kirk </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

.... but don't exclude the underclassmen from those types of roles if nobody else is a expert of note either; they're not necessarily significantly less qualified/experienced if it is a 1st or 2nd year team.

[RollingCamel]

Originally posted by Santorican:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Kirk Feldkamp:
As someone that started a team from scratch, I don't think you can afford to NOT use whoever you can get. I found it was never hard to find people... it was hard to find good people. When you figure out who has real interest, and real skills to bring to the table, you just have to keep them in the loop (communication) and involved (responsible for stuff) with the project. If you make your deliverable expectations clear and someone fails to deliver, then don't be afraid to move around tasks until you find someone that can get the job done. After some trial and error, you will find a core group of people that are willing to put in the time to make things happen. Once you find that core group, hold on to them! In the early days, we had more than a few 1st and 2nd year kids get involved, most of which ended up becoming strong team leaders. A few years down the road the "buddy system" might make more sense, but it's a pretty bold assumption that the upperclassmen actually know what they're doing if you guys haven't done this sort of thing before!

-Kirk

So right now just focus on getting a core group of students before worrying about involving under classmates in design? </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

We were also a 1st year team and have gone through what you are going through. When I started creating the team I called for young volunteers too. It was a graduation project so we had official members and volunteers who don't share the same responsibilities as the members. Since we were starting from scratch in terms of knowledge, having the young volunteers reading and collecting information with us was greatly beneficial, although there was one character who was a nuisance for the team members. It doesn't need strong engineering background to learn and understand the basics of auto engineering.

So in term of the sticking to the learning curve they were close or same as we were. Therefor, if it is not a graduation project they can be members from the start, if they start with the team. However, the 2 had their own issues one had serious family problems and the other was extremely irritating to other members and couldn't find a good way of communication.

When we delved into the design phase, we couldn't afford losing focus on having other new volunteers in this phase. In this phase we can't involve new volunteers because of the knowledge gap that needs to be built up again.

At the manufacturing phase, we started to call for volunteers again. They were extremely helpful in manual tasks and other miscellaneous ones.

To sum up, IMO, for a new team either have volunteers from the start or after finishing the design phase.

[thewoundedsoldier]

Kirk brings up excellent points. At this point your priority should be reaping any talent that you find, not necessarily sowing it.

Why not use an experienced nearby school to be the 'big brothers' to you that you want to be to your underclassmen? Here in NorCal, all the schools are pretty tight (SJSU, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, CalPoly) and I have learned a lot from them on many different levels.

Anyways, back to the main point--I agree with Kirk that you should utilize all tools at your disposal while you are in the team-building stage, and maybe worry more about a "legacy" system later.

[Big Mo]

Getting freshmen to stick around after the first brush with FSAE is where the Big Brother approach works. But getting them to stick around a second semester, and to "set" them into the team as a member (the "right" kind of member) requires a release in oversight. We give our prospects a little intro, then let them pick something they want to build that can help the team, but won't directly jeopardize the car design.

My first project was a set of quick jacks. The current freshman is building a pit-cart. And we have plenty more stuff we could use...

But you've got to let them run free, and they will see working as a part of the team as more of a project and less of a class. If you hover and constantly ask for update, they will lose interest and put it off.

[Nick Renold]

Somehow, I have managed to keep 6 brand new and 1 continuing underclassmen interested in doing suspension work.

In the beginning of last quarter, we had them all working together in the computer lab on Solidworks tutorials, making suspension sketches, making tire data graphs, doing some readings about suspension, etc. I am actually really surprised that they stuck through the difficult learning curve, but the ones who really enjoy learning and want a challenge will stick around.

This quarter and at the end of last, we have transitioned smoothly into design work. First, I had them model existing parts such as the muffler, steering wheel, etc. that will be used in our actual design work. Then we moved onto the conceptual, and eventually detailed design of diff mounts, rockers, and steering assembly.

I typically set the underclassmen into pairs when doing their projects. This way, they don't get stuck as easily, they don't get lonely, they bond together as a class, and if one of them can't come to a meeting there is still progress to be made.

I find that they make good progress if I do a quick update at the beginning of the meeting, check in on them once or twice during the work hour(s) to see if they need problems solved, and then review what they did at the end of the work time. Too much hovering and I have the urge to micromanage, and too little help and it's easy for them to get off track or miss some design constraint.

[RollingCamel]

Onii-chan!