Members of the Rutgers Formula Racing Team, (from left) Umur Selek, Omar Ashraf and Derek Horton, work on the team's competition car on the Busch campus. / Jason Towlen/STAFF
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-->-->NEW BRUNSWICK — In 2009, the Rutgers Formula Racing Team was broke and running out of time.
The recession had kept many of its sponsors from supporting the team, which each year builds an open wheel, open cockpit racing car to compete with cars built by other engineering students around the world.
Some of those teams enjoy rich sponsorships from major players in the automotive industry that yield upwards of $100,000 a year in funding in the United States. A German team once netted $250,000.
The Rutgers team receives about $8,000 in fees from engineering students, $4,000 from the engineering school to compete in two events and some cash and free services donated by private companies, such as Sunoco and Sport Honda Powerhouse of Metuchen. The total budget including the donated services is between $20,000 and $25,000.
But the donations fell so low two years ago that the students had to dig deep. Team members came up with $10,000 from their own pockets, team members and the team's staff adviser said.
It paid off. Rutgers came in third in design that year out of about 120 teams from around the world, a huge podium finish given the relatively low amount of financing the team sees.
Abhir Adhate, a senior this year and the team's technical lead, used a credit card to come up with $1,000 in 2009, he said.
But for Adhate, the money was an investment.
He received an internship with Pratt & Whitney that year, based largely on his work on the car. The Connecticut company designs, manufactures and services aircraft engines, space propulsion systems and industrial gas turbines.
Students in colleges and universities have been participating in activities such as these for decades. For 20 years now, FIRST robotics has been providing an equivalent challenge and opportunity to high school students. Programs such as these need to be integrated into more high school and middle school programs.
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