Student Leadership

Conversational Think Pieces

How to Define Success – The definition of success is “the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.” What’s the point of defining success for each subteam? We want you to create SMART goals so we can help you feel accomplished at the end of the season. The goal of defining what success looks like helps your team stay productive during the season. We want to know what each subteam needs to accomplish in order for the upcoming season to be successful as a whole.

How to Increase Engagement – Our team never really has an issue with interest in robotics, but with how to create engagement in the events we are doing. Students tend to join robotics with the thought of getting to work on robots right away, not learning the basics. Then there is the fact that business is a crucial part of any team, but it’s not typically why people join robotics. How do you get people to do something they weren’t intending?

How to Run Meetings – The point of a meeting is to share information, solve problems, and keep the team working together. It sounds super easy, however, I’m sure everyone can think of a meeting they’ve been in that was not efficient or effective. Our goal is to make the most out of the time that we have.

Leadership & Teaching – There are many different types of leaders and not every leadership style fits everyone. It’s all about figuring out what style matches you the best. We are going to focus on how to apply leadership skills when working with your peers. The important thing to remember is that every member of your subteam loves our team and wants to make it better. They are trying to help in their own way and we just need to get everyone on the same page.

Conducting Difficult Conversations – I’m sure everyone can think of a time where they have had a difficult conversation. Whether you were the only one receiving the information or giving it. Figuring out how to have these conversations is a never-ending skill. The goal of this page is to help put a few new tools in your toolbox for navigating these situations.

Managing Stressful Situations – While FIRST Robotics can be a wonderful organization to participate in, it can also be quite stressful. Build season tends to create a high tension environment for both the mentors and students on the team. As leaders on the team, it is your job to help everyone navigate through these situations.

Staying Organized – Talon Robotics always has a lot of different events going on. It can be difficult as a captain to keep all the events straight. While you don’t need to be at every event yourself, your team will expect you to be knowledgeable about what is going on.

FRC Mentors

New Talon Robotics Mentors

What is Mentoring? – Mentoring in robotics can be many different things. On our team, mentoring means “someone with valuable experience and knowledge who offers guidance and support.” But that doesn’t necessarily mean you need anything about engineering to help out! We try to support our students so they can become the best and most successful people they can be.

Student Lead, Mentor Guided – You might hear this phrase a lot on Talon Robotics. The role of mentors on our team is to provide support to help the students reach their goals. One of my favorite parts of Talon is how prepared our students are for life after high school. Think of it like the students are learning how to ride a bike, and we as the mentors are the parents who are watching closely to support. The students work together to figure out the best direction to head towards, and our mentors provide guide rails to help them from going into oncoming traffic and getting too injured in the process.

Registering to be a Mentor – The steps listed in this document are about what you need to do to become a mentor.

How to Know What’s Going On – The steps listed in this document show you how and where to find out what’s happening on the team.

Mentoring for the First Time – Thank you so much for being willing to help out with mentoring. We are so lucky to have you helping us out. Here is a how-to about mentoring for the first couple of times.

From Talon Robotics Mentor Meeting Training Segments

2025 Mentor Meetings – Notes from the discussions during our mentor meetings around various leadership topics.

2024 Mentor Meetings – Notes from the discussions during our mentor meetings around various leadership topics.

Mentor Development

How to Handle Excessive Teasing Behavior – Our job as mentors is to make sure we are cultivating a safe environment for our students. The easiest way to create this space is by having a positive atmosphere. You want to make sure that students are being nice to each other, to their mentors, and to other teams. In the same realm, the mentors need to be a good example of positivity as well.

Implicit Bias – Regardless of how neutral you think you are to any type of topic, you will always have some types of bias. Everyone is going to have overt biases like thinking your robotics team is the best or that your football team is far superior than the other or that sweet is better than savory. Having biases isn’t necessarily the problem. It’s how you respond to them that is important.

Managing Miscommunication After It Happens – Miscommunication is something that we’ve all experienced before. Navigating these situations is crucial to the success of your team. The goal is to avoid getting any wires crossed on the robot and with the people involved in the program. How can you avoid miscommunication when even just the slightest mistake can cause major issues?

Preventing Miscommunication – In order to avoid it, we need to know exactly what miscommunication is. The dictionary definition is the failure to communicate adequately. Our students only have two months to build, design, and program their robots. We want to make sure their time is spent on creating the best robot for the season and not in meetings to address avoidable issues.

Robotics Safety Tips & Tricks – While an incredibly important program, robotics can also be dangerous. Students are working with machines and tools that could lead to major injuries. What do you need to do to keep everyone injury free and leave the program with the same amount of extremities that they started with?

FIRST Provided Resources

New to FIRST – I think this is a great resource for those of you who are new to FIRST Robotics. It goes over a lot of the basics about FIRST as a whole and the overall program. The resource libraries for each program are also listed. If you have experience with FIRST, feel free to go through this as a refresher.

FIRST EDI (STEM FOR EVERYONE) – If you haven’t had any training relating to Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, this training, created by FIRST is a great resource. Even if you have gone through previous training, this is a good refresher on the basics and ways to make sure our students have the best experience.

FIRST’s Youth Protection Policies – The FIRST mission is to inspire a generation of science and technology leaders who are both gracious and professional. This FIRST Code of Conduct lists some of the basic behaviors mentors, coaches, volunteers, team members, affiliate partners, contractors, staff, and other participants should adhere to while participating in FIRST activities.

FIRST Coach/Mentor Checklist – The steps listed in this document are about what FIRST recommends when becoming a new Coach/Mentor

General Timeline – The information in this document is meant to serve as a guide to an existing mentor to welcome and guide a new mentor into the FIRST experience. While this does not go into great detail on any one point, it is filled with topics and links that can be useful in guiding a new mentor.

FIRST Manuals & Guides – These are always good to reference and have in your back pocket. I think mentors should reference these every couple of years or as issues come up. They are in depth but well organized, so you can jump to the sections that you want to reference.

FIRST Volunteer Resources – A condensed list of the resources that FIRST has to support its volunteers.

FIRST Safety Manual – This safety manual is an easy-to-use guide for important safety information and provides students with a basic set of requirements to maintain a safe environment during the build season and at competition events. It applies to anyone involved with FIRST, including all student members, mentors, volunteers, and spectators.This document serves to educate and provide guidelines for teams. For enforced rules at events, teams, and staff/volunteers should refer to the relevant competition or game manuals.

Minnesota Mandated Reporter Training

Self-Paced Training – This self-paced 15-minute training is designed for employees or supervisors of private or public youth recreation programs who must make a report if they have reason to believe that maltreatment of a child has occurred.

Mandated Reporter Training – Mandated Reporter Training is a self-paced learning module that is designed for professionals identified by law who must make a report if suspected or known child maltreatment has occurred. This training features videos, quizzes, and activities that can be completed through self-study. Expect this training to be around 60 minutes.

Mandated Reporter Resources to Support Children & Families – These resources are not exhaustive and are meant to give you a better idea of how your role as a mandated reporter can serve to connect families with resources in the community.

Youth Program Tip Sheet – Summarized steps that you will need to follow if a student of a youth program tells you something that you will need to report.