View Full Version : Chairman's Award Concerns
Jedward45
31-03-2012, 20:37
First things first, I'd like to congratulate team 1816 on another Chairmans Award! The team has always been inspirational for Minnesota teams and is always very gracious and professional while doing so. I hope nobody miss-construes what i am about to say as being anything less than proud of their accomplishments.
That said, over my 7 years of experience in FIRST, there are some things I have observed about chairmans that are beginning to trouble me.
The first concern I have is that teams may be stretching the impact and scope of their outreach. While I originally wrote off these as harmless mistakes of leaving out inconvenient details, I have now observed teams creating very misleading testimonies about their experiences. In some cases, teams have implied their participation in an event was equivalent to creating that event, usually by putting it within a list of other events they created.
I now must admit I have observed this occurring to my team's projects, and as such I may have lost objectivity on discussing this problem. As such I would like to know if any other teams have had similar experiences to mine or not.
However, even if I were to write off all of these concerns as paranoia (and trust me, I really wish I could; many of these teams have gained my respect and admiration over the years), there is something even more troubling. Several very veteran teams have begun measuring their impact on FIRST by measuring the impact of the teams they once helped to mentor. At best this is misleading, implying a connection can be drawn between helping a team begin and what new team members do years later. At worst this could become a pyramid scheme, where the oldest teams can always claim the work of younger teams as their own, appearing vastly more influential in spreading FIRST.
All of these concerned are compounded by what I believe to be an inability of checking the validity of statements. As far as I am aware, teams have always been trusted to be gracious and professional in reporting their team truthfully. While I like this system, I think its reasonable to say nobody is perfect and we are all susceptible to over-estimating ourselves. However, I think teams that are truly gracious and professional would want someone to remind them when they have deviated from the core ideas of FIRST in order to win an award.
Please let me know if you've shared similar experiences or have an alternative explanation for what I have observed. As stubborn as I know I can be, this is one thing I really hope I am wrong about.
Lavapicker
01-04-2012, 04:37
I'm surprised no one has hit you over the head with the proverbial GP bat for your comments. I've been at this for almost ten years now and have seen what you are talking about. Sadly, several times. I don't know if its getting more prevalent or if our experience allows me to notice it more. While none of us are in the interview room and can be sure of what was said, it becomes obvious when team websites tout outreaach and programs as their own and you know otherwise. Sometimes its the wording, as you mentioned, that gives the appearance that they were involved more than they were. I know you want to portray your team in the best possible light but If a team wants to stoop to that level to acquire a plastic trophy what can you do? I do believe in Karma! 5 minutes to present and then 5 to ask questions is not enough to find these inconsitencies if you ask me. Yes, I know the judges are supposed to look at team pages and the essay too but they are very restricted as well. I've asked that judges for this award come from the robotic community and are not professors and engineers who don't know the teams. Who better to know what the Chairmans is really for and if teams are embelishing their accomplishments than people who are active in robotics. Perhaps FIRST can allow more time for judges to get to know the teams so they can truly assess what a team is actually doing. How sad when teams mirror the real world of politics to bend the truth for their own favor, yet it does go on and until some changes are made it appears to be a way to win it if you are willing to stoop to that level?
Tristan Lall
01-04-2012, 05:26
I was actually having a conversation about something like this today (though not about any specific team's truthfulness).
It struck me that because teams give their presentations behind closed doors, to a set of judges who are very often not in a position to check facts (much less check facts within the limited timeframe of an event), there's great potential for inaccuracies (intentional or unintentional) to affect the process.
So what about making video of the interviews available after the award is given? (You can't simulcast them, because teams will draw cues from the ones ahead of them. You probably don't want to reveal them before the award, because the suspense is useful.) That holds the teams strictly accountable for what they say, because large chunks of the FIRST community will (effectively) crowd-source the fact-checking. If it is evident that some team exaggerated their accomplishments, maybe the judges at the Championship will have reason to overlook them this year. At the very least, the team will have to do some sort of damage control to protect their reputation.
There is some bad that could come of this openness. For example, what if a team member tells a falsehood, but says it confidently? Will we know if they were lying, or just mistaken? Was it a team decision, or an individual one? Will we jump to conclusions and undeservedly ruin a reputation?
Nevertheless, it's probably fair to say that, despite the faults of some journalists and the news-consuming public, more than any other thing, it's journalism that keeps politicians in check. Could the same be said of FRC?
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 12:04
The longer you dwell on doubt and shadows, the further you remove yourself from trust and the light of integrity. It's a natural consequence.
This applies to every thought given to anything politically motivated or how teams take advantage of the system. You can spend your time spinning tales or you can do something useful - like work on the character of your contributions to the FIRST experience for yourself, your team, and your community.
Leave the decisions to the judges. Leave the judges and the process in which they arrive to the decisions - alone. Trust the process.
Jane
I've wanted to see (and my kids to see) other teams Chairman's presentations, not to see if they are telling the truth, but to see what they are doing and to help us do better. This was the first year that 2914 has submitted for Chairman's and with one student that has done FIRST before, we have a lot of room for improvement. 116 was gracious enough at the DC regional to do their presentation again for several members of 2914 so we could get a feel for what other teams are doing and how we can improve going forward.
I know the schedule is already jam packed, and many venues may not have available space, but setting aside a few hour long blocks and a quiet space where teams can give their presentation to anyone that wants to see would be a good thing, in my opinion. They say it's not about the robots, but the robots often are all that are formally presented to everyone at the regional.
Let's celebrate the change.
Wetzel
Do I think this happens sometimes? Yes.
Can I prove it? Probably not, and I don't want to spend time on a quest to defame another team.
Do I think most teams or even a significant portion of RCA winners do it? Nope.
But I do see what you're getting at, and when I see certain things I get the feeling that it is happening, and sometimes it does bug me.
This is one of those things, though, where I just do my best to keep my team on the straight and narrow. When I'm helping the kids prepare their essay and presentation (although I'm not the most help on the team by any means ;) ) I act as somewhat of an auditor, making sure we did what we say and more importantly making sure the kids realize what they mean.
We won our first RCA award last year, and it was such an amazing feeling. years of hard work, writing, and presentations finally led to that moment. We felt we had truly earned it. I would never want to cast doubt on or defame another team in that position (and I do understand that you are NOT trying to do that:))
Realistically I'm not sure how much more could be done. At the WI regional this year, 25 teams, which was over half the regional, submitted. This was AWESOME! However, the original presentation scheduled went from right after opening ceremonies Friday to halfway through eliminations on Saturday. Imagine if we got to a point where nearly every team submitted for Chairman's. If a regional average attendance was 50, the number of average applicants would be much above the number we had at WI.
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 12:29
I've wanted to see (and my kids to see) other teams Chairman's presentations, not to see if they are telling the truth, but to see what they are doing and to help us do better. This was the first year that 2914 has submitted for Chairman's and with one student that has done FIRST before, we have a lot of room for improvement. 116 was gracious enough at the DC regional to do their presentation again for several members of 2914 so we could get a feel for what other teams are doing and how we can improve going forward.
I know the schedule is already jam packed, and many venues may not have available space, but setting aside a few hour long blocks and a quiet space where teams can give their presentation to anyone that wants to see would be a good thing, in my opinion. They say it's not about the robots, but the robots often are all that are formally presented to everyone at the regional.
Let's celebrate the change.
Wetzel
Wisdom.
Kudos to 116 for that. It's a win win for both teams.
This would also be helpful with Business Plans, too.
Jane
I've wanted to see (and my kids to see) other teams Chairman's presentations, not to see if they are telling the truth, but to see what they are doing and to help us do better. This was the first year that 2914 has submitted for Chairman's and with one student that has done FIRST before, we have a lot of room for improvement. 116 was gracious enough at the DC regional to do their presentation again for several members of 2914 so we could get a feel for what other teams are doing and how we can improve going forward.
Wetzel
Excellent idea!
I've toyed with the idea of asking if a team could videotape their presentation so other teams could see the presentation process and perhaps be inspired to come up with more effective presentations. However, there are drawbacks if teams focus too much on their 5 minute presentation rather than how the team works towards their vision of FIRST core values.
Watching a voluntary "live" presentation allows teams to not only see some good presentations, but to interact with team members who are striving to change the culture. That interaction and exchange of ideas and issues would really be one public display of what FIRST is all about.
Any team could find a place at a competition (even the parking lot!) and publicize the time and place. Saturday would be a good time since the presentations to the judges would be completed and the presenters would have chance to give their impressions on what the judges focused on.
I really like this idea! I would love to see the presentations!
Tetraman
01-04-2012, 13:26
It's true that sometimes it feels like the truth is stretched, and I bet at least one part of every Chairmans award submission from every team has been structured in such a way that it makes the team appear better than they actually were.
However, I agree with Jane here, you have to trust the judges and the process - that's all that the rest ofus have going for it. You can be assured, however, that the teams who win the Championship Chairmans award don't embellish their accomplishments.
Jedward45
01-04-2012, 13:37
Thanks for all the input. Personally I don't think the system is fundamentally broken; it has shown in general to work well over the years. However, just like robot designs have progressed over the years, I think we can always work to improve the structure of the activity. I think making essays and presentations public would not only help other teams learn an incredible amount about how to improve their team, but also keep teams honest about what they present.
I've had this problem for a number of years, and I don't know exactly what the solution would be. While I err towards trusting the judges and their judgement (especially at the Championship level), in talking to many teams after regionals I've heard many shock/anger stories about the events the CA-winning team claimed to play a large part in, from both mentors and students. That is not to say that I have ever encountered a team that didn't deserve to win chairman's that did, however, I could see a case being made for overstating one's accomplishments.
The fact of the matter is that since we don't know what exactly is said or claimed in the interview, or sometimes even the submission, the best practice here is to just be honest about your team's accomplishments, and if you worked with another team, acknowledge their help (and if you feel you need to, specify what help they gave). In this way the judges will get a better picture of your team and how other teams interact with you.
I am all for opening up interviews/submissions in some way. If we can do it in a way that will satisfy those teams looking to preserve competitive advantage, then I think it's something we can easily accomplish.
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 13:48
Thanks for all the input. Personally I don't think the system is fundamentally broken; it has shown in general to work well over the years. However, just like robot designs have progressed over the years, I think we can always work to improve the structure of the activity. I think making essays and presentations public would not only help other teams learn an incredible amount about how to improve their team, but also keep teams honest about what they present.
There's always going to be subjectivity involved no matter what happens with the CA process.
Here's an example... let's say teams talk about the events they create, found, or host. How well are those events planned, organized, and executed? The participants know because they have participated, true, but the judges won't know that. The judges will only know that the events were created, founded, or hosted. That's the bottom line.
And, we have to remember - the bottom line is impact. How has the team impacted others? We can sit in judgement of other teams - that's easy to do. What's hard to do is continue to improve ourselves and bring a quality entry filled with integrity to the Chairman's process.
If we really want to help improve the process and bring change through more transparency - then we have to do it in a constructive and positive light that will benefit everyone. The judgement has to go.
Jane
PayneTrain
01-04-2012, 14:03
Why not have the teams judges are seriously considering for the award present before alliance selections? Pick the top three or four and have them present on the field. You'll get:
a) An opportunity for teams to see what these prospective teams have done
b) An opportunity for the FIRST community to crowdsource the fact-checking if necessary
c) An easy way for all teams to see the award, provided they are archived alongside match videos.
d) And many more!
The longer you dwell on doubt and shadows, the further you remove yourself from trust and the light of integrity. It's a natural consequence.
This applies to every thought given to anything politically motivated or how teams take advantage of the system. You can spend your time spinning tales or you can do something useful - like work on the character of your contributions to the FIRST experience for yourself, your team, and your community.
Leave the decisions to the judges. Leave the judges and the process in which they arrive to the decisions - alone. Trust the process.
Jane
I believe the OP is doing anything but spinning tales, he is trying to improve a system to make it more accountable. Just as we have police officers to enforce laws in the real world, or refs and inspectors to ensure robots are following the rules, making the chairmans process more accountable will make a system which removes the possibility of doubt while simultaneously improving the accuracy of presentations and allowing everyone to see the inspirational work of others.
I'm all in favor of taping the presentations and releasing them,
- Alex
Jedward45
01-04-2012, 14:12
If we really want to help improve the process and bring change through more transparency - then we have to do it in a constructive and positive light that will benefit everyone. The judgement has to go.
Jane
Making things more transparent does not need to include an active process of teams criticizing or judging other teams. It could be as passive as teams choosing to be more honest in their presentations because they have to present their accomplishments to others.
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 14:23
If the Chairman's Award has become mired in an atmosphere of distrust and needs policing, then it is the teams that should be held accountable for creating that atmosphere. All of the teams.
I have been on the receiving end of being told that our team has exaggerated what it has done in our community. The person who made the accusations was invited to spend time with our team and to see what we do in our shop and in our community. He did not take me up on my offer.
You can ask for videos of presentations and you can crowdsource the fact-checking if necessary. You can display the presentation teams on the field before eliminations and push them into an atmosphere of being fed to the lions.
Or, you can allow the process to work and rely on the credentials and credibility of the judges. Yes, there are ways to make the process more transparent - such as the suggestions that Jeff and Dr. Cameron have made. Their suggestions remind us of the value of our community not the need for self-appointed police.
Jane
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 14:25
Making things more transparent does not need to include an active process of teams criticizing or judging other teams. It could be as passive as teams choosing to be more honest in their presentations because they have to present their accomplishments to others.
Pretty much.
In a manner that improves our FRC community as a whole.
Jane
Jedward45
01-04-2012, 14:31
In a manner that improves our FRC community as a whole.
Just for clarification, what specific methods of improving transparency wouldn't improve the FIRST community? —what effective alternatives do you support?
elemental
01-04-2012, 14:33
I might be wrong, but I believe I read that, starting next year, Regional Chairman award winner's essays will be posted on usfirst.org. This might be an incentive for submitting teams to evaluate their claims before submitting.
From a team's vantage point, the best way to demonstrate impact is through documentation. Take lots of pictures and get written feedback. Make scrapbooks of events, news items, flyers, etc. Leave the notebooks in your pit area and allow other teams to look through them.
If a regional is local, invite FLL and FTC teams that you mentored and give them a tour of your pit. (I gave a tour to an FLL team last year and it turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the regional!)
Judges also can talk to rookies that older teams mentor and ask about level of support.
Edit: Here is the post that mentions posting essays on usfirst.org: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1147286&postcount=12
JaneYoung
01-04-2012, 14:47
This:
Excellent idea!
I've toyed with the idea of asking if a team could videotape their presentation so other teams could see the presentation process and perhaps be inspired to come up with more effective presentations. However, there are drawbacks if teams focus too much on their 5 minute presentation rather than how the team works towards their vision of FIRST core values.
Watching a voluntary "live" presentation allows teams to not only see some good presentations, but to interact with team members who are striving to change the culture. That interaction and exchange of ideas and issues would really be one public display of what FIRST is all about.
Any team could find a place at a competition (even the parking lot!) and publicize the time and place. Saturday would be a good time since the presentations to the judges would be completed and the presenters would have chance to give their impressions on what the judges focused on.
I really like this idea! I would love to see the presentations!
If any proposals are made to FIRST HQ regarding more transparent opportunities involving the Chairman's Award process, they should be done in a thoughtful manner that highlights the integrity aspect of the teams that submit for the Award and the desire to maintain the quality and integrity of the Award, itself.
I am not in favor of crowdsourcing and fact-checking in an arena-type atmosphere. It would open our community to more subjectivity, not less, in my opinion.
Jane
This:
If any proposals are made to FIRST HQ
...
I am not in favor of crowdsourcing and fact-checking in an arena-type atmosphere. It would open our community to more subjectivity, not less, in my opinion.
Jane
The reason I liked Wetzel's idea of teams volunteering to publicly perform their Chairman's presentation:
As long as we have been hosting FLL competitions, we have live video feeds of the kids presentations streamed to room(s) so parents and others can see the presentations. It is very popular. It is amazing to see the performances and creativity of teams. It is especially informative for rookie teams to see the variety of presentations.
As for FRC, I've always been a bit bothered by the almost secrecy of Chairman's presentations. On the whole, team 842 has found that sharing information about robots, robot designs and our Chairman essays have helped others and has been an asset to us as we build communications with other teams.
We have always offered and have been willing to help other teams with "Chairman's advice". This year, as always, the Coconuts previewed their presentation to some of our team. The Coconuts were awarded their 3rd CA this year. Intrateam cooperation creates a better Chairman's presentation just like it creates better robots.
Our team, 842, has not done a Chairman's presentation for a few years since we were awarded the Championship Chairman. Otherwise, I would suggest our team plan to voluntarily perform our presentation, and a Q&A on Saturday of the regional and world so newer teams and veteran can learn, criticize, interact and share. It would take some of the mystery out of a process that only three members of a team experience.
I would think other teams would want to do the same.
Not required, not dependant on FIRST approval, not resource costly… Just sharing experiences.
Mark Sheridan
01-04-2012, 16:49
To me this is very similar to an interview process. Knowing the people who conduct interviews at my company, a large part of the thought process about of the potential candidate is being able to determine if the person actually did what they claimed. It involves a lot of follow up questions, calling up references and requesting the citation of sources. I remember in my interview showing my CAD drawings to demonstrate my proficiency.
I feel all the FIRST judges are experienced enough to go through this very same process. Asking detailed questions would sort out most situations. If we wanted more fact checking. Perhaps being able to cite references would help. If a team had a newspaper article describing their community work, seems to me like a good thing to put in a chairmans essay as a reference. If a team started an FLL team, list the contact info of those teams.
Overall, I feel the judges already know that the truth can be stretched. I am positive they ask the right questions and find the truth. I doubt a team would lack enough integrity to try to deceive the judges. If they did, i feel it would be obvious.
It is not the FIRST public's job to judge the validity of a team's statements. That is in the hands of the judges, many of whom have been judging Regional and Championship Chairman's Awards for years now, I'd like to think they are pretty good at what they do.
What I advocate instead is to talk to the teams who have submitted a Chairman's Award, wether you are entering or not. While simply watching presentations are all well and good, please keep in mind that a 5 minute presentation cannot come close to explaining an entire team's history. Going to a team's pit and talking to students and mentors who helped plan and execute their events will provide you with much more information.
This year while in St. Louis or at your respective regionals take the time to talk to students and learn how they ran their events, started other teams, and gave back to their community. Learn from each other, isn't that what FIRST is all about? Inspiring others to spread the word and give back to the communities that have already given so much to the teams. Rather than wasting time fact checking every little comment to disqualify someone's claim why not do something more in your community? Strive to inspire more! If you're upset a team claimed they helped the same rookie you did, create another rookie team next year, host an offseason event! Tell people about FIRST at Pancake Breakfast's! Alert the presses! Take Photos! Get your team out there in public, once you see everyone you help along the way their thanks will be more important to you than winning a trophy, and sooner or later the judges will take notice. Winning the Chairman's Award should not be all about the trophy, it's about the journey to get there and celebrating your team's accomplishments.
I might be wrong, but I believe I read that, starting next year, Regional Chairman award winner's essays will be posted on usfirst.org. This might be an incentive for submitting teams to evaluate their claims before submitting.
Edit: Here is the post that mentions posting essays on usfirst.org: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1147286&postcount=12
It was announced in Oct. 2011 that starting in 2012, all winning RCA written submissions would be posted on the usfirst.org site within a week of earning the award.
The recording can be found here: http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/frc-senior-mentor-teleconference-recordings
When I inquired a couple of weeks ago I was told that it was not being implemented this year.
I was disappointed. It's not the fact-checking I am interested in. It's the inspiration.
Katie_UPS
01-04-2012, 20:51
I respect this thread for bringing up the elephant in many rooms and addressing it, even though the immediate response can potentially be that the OP is unGP.
A true chairman's team will share their paper and presentation with anyone who asks, because its not about the award but the process teams go through (competition for the chairman's award is the best). I can't imagine a team who is chairman's caliber not sharing their wealth of knowledge for the thrill of the win.
My $.02.
Jedward45
01-04-2012, 21:50
I can't imagine a team who is chairman's caliber not sharing their wealth of knowledge for the thrill of the win.
For starters, thanks for not labeling me unGP. GP has truly changed the way i perceive competitions and robotics. It pains me when people assume any criticism is malicious and/or ungracious. I may be on a bit of a tangent here, but personally I view constructive criticism as essential to GP, as people who bury their concerns can sometimes have an explosive outburst later on.... as we've all seen on this forum before.
On to the issue at hand:
While most chairmans teams do rightfully serve as an inspiration for others, I see the potential for teams that feel their projects or events were claimed to loose that valuable sentiment.
Levansic
12-04-2012, 23:37
Chairman's is really hard to discuss online, because so many people tie so much emotion to their views about the award and judging of the award. Plain text just can't carry the full weight of the discussion, without being misinterpreted by a few participants.
This being said, my team just won their second RCA this weekend at Las Vegas. We weren't expecting this award, as there were so many great teams at that regional.
Our team had been in existence since 2000, and when my wife and I joined, in the 2009 season, they had not yet won the award. Winning a RCA was an all-consuming obsession for the outgoing advisor and head mentor. My wife was the new advisor, and we were both rather put-off with constantly hearing "this will look good for Chairman's" while the discussed act was superficial and usually external to the team's activities.
We forced a culture change within the team. All mention of the Chairman's award was banished. The team started STEM outreach programs, with real commitments of time from the team members. We gave talks to civic groups and industry conferences, to explain FIRST and the importance of STEM education. The team expanded to a year-round club, instead of just meeting during build and competition season. We instituted mentor conduct rules, and emphasized Gracious Professionalism. We did our best to help a neighboring team that self-destructed during build. With all of this, we saw ourselves on the path to becoming the team we thought we could be someday, but nothing really special, yet.
As a NASA team, we submitted a Chairman's essay as required, and presented on our actual efforts. At the 2010 Las Vegas regional, we won our first RCA. We were stunned, and sincerely humbled by the recognition.
What does this rambling mean for the RCA and judging? Not much. Just that this was our path for success. Ignore the award. Do the right things, and set the right culture in your team. Document your real efforts, set high expectations for conduct embracing Gracious Professionalism, and have fun!
-- Len
nobrakes8
13-04-2012, 00:28
It was announced in Oct. 2011 that starting in 2012, all winning RCA written submissions would be posted on the usfirst.org site within a week of earning the award.
The recording can be found here: http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/frc/frc-senior-mentor-teleconference-recordings
When I inquired a couple of weeks ago I was told that it was not being implemented this year.
I was disappointed. It's not the fact-checking I am interested in. It's the inspiration.
I'm disappointed as well. I really wanted to see what smaller teams who may have won the chairman's award had done to see if there is anything our team could be doing better with limited resources.
Also, a point one of the speakers made on that phone call is that sometimes teams who do exaggerate their role in doing something get caught. Team X may take full credit for mentoring a rookie or FLL team and a few presentations later Team Y may present specifics showing how they actually played a major role in mentoring that same team --so sometimes teams get weeded out pretty easily. I'd be surprised to find many teams crossing the line from exaggeration to blatantly lying.
AllenGregoryIV
13-04-2012, 02:54
I'm disappointed as well. I really wanted to see what smaller teams who may have won the chairman's award had done to see if there is anything our team could be doing better with limited resources.
.
If you're interested in smaller teams that have won Chairman's take a look at our thread here (http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/37794)
I've posted just about all of our Chairman's stuff there. I'm hoping to get a video of the team practicing the presentation up with in the next few weeks.
We really didn't expect to win Chairman's this year, so anything we can do to help other small and upstart teams have a shot, we are happy to do.
CA is suppose to be the top award in FIRST. We are here discussing teams that maybe stretch the truth. Maybe the real issue is that more time MUST be taken with the teams to discuss, question and evaluate. 10 minutes for the top award. Are you kidding? If there are a lot of teams then have 2 or 3 panels of judges. Each panel could choose the top of their group and then have all judges present for a second presentation (can be shorter) of the 3 in contention. A decision could then be made with all judges present.
Maybe I am wrong but how can a judge make an informed decision in 10 minutes. I have seen judges spend way more than that talking to teams about other awards. Give them the time they need and throw away the clock. Better decisions can be made with more time for questions and answers. Will this be perfect, no BUT it will be 100% better.
AllenGregoryIV
13-04-2012, 03:03
CA is suppose to be the top award in FIRST. We are here discussing teams that maybe stretch the truth. Maybe the real issue is that more time MUST be taken with the teams to discuss, question and evaluate. 10 minutes for the top award. Are you kidding? If there are a lot of teams then have 2 or 3 panels of judges. Each panel could choose the top of their group and then have all judges present for a second presentation (can be shorter) of the 3 in contention. A decision could then be made with all judges present.
Maybe I am wrong but how can a judge make an informed decision in 10 minutes. I have seen judges spend way more than that talking to teams about other awards. Give them the time they need and throw away the clock. Better decisions can be made with more time for questions and answers. Will this be perfect, no BUT it will be 100% better.
I would hope that FIRST is looking into changing the judging process for Chairman's. I imagine the video submission will soon be due at the same time as the essay, that way we can almost get rid of the presentation and just have question and answers at the regional. I think that's how the judges truly learn what a team is about anyway.
waialua359
13-04-2012, 03:12
CA is suppose to be the top award in FIRST. We are here discussing teams that maybe stretch the truth. Maybe the real issue is that more time MUST be taken with the teams to discuss, question and evaluate. 10 minutes for the top award. Are you kidding? If there are a lot of teams then have 2 or 3 panels of judges. Each panel could choose the top of their group and then have all judges present for a second presentation (can be shorter) of the 3 in contention. A decision could then be made with all judges present.
Maybe I am wrong but how can a judge make an informed decision in 10 minutes. I have seen judges spend way more than that talking to teams about other awards. Give them the time they need and throw away the clock. Better decisions can be made with more time for questions and answers. Will this be perfect, no BUT it will be 100% better.
I sometimes question this for several reasons, one of which IMO, FIRST didnt deliver when it came to promoting its goals at its highest moment this year.
Rich Kressly
13-04-2012, 09:24
the whole process is the most valuable part, not the award itself ...
1. as a team, engage in the process as deeply as you can - you won't regret it.
2. Learn from others as much as you can (and, yes, FIRST needs to deliver on helping spread that information - ESPECIALLY WHEN IT'S WRITTEN IN THE RULES :P). Perhaps some of the HofF teams might get together and help push the agenda and/or begin to create and share like the WFA's have - http://themobius.wordpress.com/ ???
3. As for the potential misrepresentations? Water off a duck's back. As soon as you start worrying or even thinking about that, you're losing focus on maintaining your own team's efforts and managing the how your team best represents itself - which is the only part you'll ever truly know or control anyway.
I don't know about teams making 'stretched' or 'inflated' or 'misleading' or 'not-totally-true' claims in their Chairman's bid, but what I DO see, frequently, is teams reusing the same wonderful things they did years ago over and over again in their Chairman's videos, effectively using the same accomplishments to win the award multiple times.
I'm not really sure how to reconcile this, because those things are clearly a part of the team's history, and clearly a part of how they do things, and even clearly a part of what makes the team deserve Chairman's. On the other hand, it seems to me like the very best teams should have enough material from the current year that makes them awesome, that the older stuff, especially content from a previous Chairman's bid that resulted in an RCA, warrants little more than a cursory mention.
Rich Kressly
13-04-2012, 10:05
I don't know about teams making 'stretched' or 'inflated' or 'misleading' or 'not-totally-true' claims in their Chairman's bid, but what I DO see, frequently, is teams reusing the same wonderful things they did years ago over and over again in their Chairman's videos, effectively using the same accomplishments to win the award multiple times.
I'm not really sure how to reconcile this, because those things are clearly a part of the team's history, and clearly a part of how they do things, and even clearly a part of what makes the team deserve Chairman's. On the other hand, it seems to me like the very best teams should have enough material from the current year that makes them awesome, that the older stuff, especially content from a previous Chairman's bid that resulted in an RCA, warrants little more than a cursory mention.
I don't think there is any mystery here as the award is about a long-term (more than one year) sustained effort. Quoting the 2012 manual,
"6.4.3 Submission Information
The criteria for the 2012 Chairman's Award are essentially identical to those in the past, with special emphasis on recent accomplishments in both the 2011/2012 year and the preceding two (2) years. The judges focus on teams’ activities over a sustained period, as distinguished from just the six (6) week design and build time frame."
So in other words the judges want to know about all of your efforts, no matter how "old", with special focus/emphasis on the most recent three years.
In addition to that, a team may have begun an outreach activity six years ago, but they still continue to participate/organize/execute it today - making it a recent activity with a long and rich history (which, coincidentally, are things that judges love - and they should)
-my .02, namaste.
Ignore the award. Do the right things, and set the right culture in your team. Document your real efforts, set high expectations for conduct embracing Gracious Professionalism, and have fun!
Absolutely !!
how can a judge make an informed decision in 10 minutes.
They can't. If the judges have not really studied the submissions before the competition then the process is broken. I'm sure it works well at some events and is probably broken at other events.
I imagine the video submission will soon be due at the same time as the essay, that way we can almost get rid of the presentation and just have question and answers at the regional. I think that's how the judges truly learn what a team is about anyway.
The PRIMARY purpose of the video is not and has never been used to do RCA judging. The primary purpose was for other teams to see how the team that is earning an award do their work. It is in the spirit of communicating, inspiring, training others to become an RCA team. FIRST has had to implement language that enforces submission of the video.
I sometimes question this for several reasons, one of which IMO, FIRST didnt deliver when it came to promoting its goals at its highest moment this year.
Glenn, I agree - they really dropped the ball on this on !!! I don't know what to say. I had the same thoughts in my head when I was standing there.
is teams reusing the same wonderful things they did years ago over and over
Chairman's allows a team to use this year plus the prior two years as part of the submission. I have seen teams go back even further than that. Sometimes it makes sense to do that.
We try to add ONE MAJOR initiative each year and a couple of lesser initiatives each year and hopefully maintain the prior initiatives as ongoing efforts. That way there is a pipeline of fresh stuff. But yes not all teams do that.
So an RCA teams has to do things consistently over a few years. A CMP CA team has to do it over 5 or even 10 years.
$ 0.02
waialua359
13-04-2012, 16:23
FIRST needs to stop saying the video is required but doesnt count towards judging.
I dont believe it anyway.
No one can argue that a 3 minute video about your program is more compelling and with greater impact, than a 10 minute presentation with Q&A.
While I think teams may win an RCA without a "good" video at a regional level, it better be "good" at the CMP level. I cant see FIRST showcasing the team earning the "Highest Award" in FIRST with a video that isnt representative of the goals they set forth............whatever that may be.:rolleyes:
the whole process is the most valuable part, not the award itself ...
I partially agree. I ask all teams that I work with to make up a CA submission even if they know they can't win. I believe that it is an exercise to keep track of team progress and goal setting.
If the award is not important then they should stop saying that it is the top award in FIRST. If is not important then why celebrate it and strive to win it?
FIRST needs to stop saying the video is required but doesnt count towards judging.
I dont believe it anyway.
I don't agree. I have not done any real survey but I have know RCA judges to say they they don't and have not watched the video.
I think the RCA teams need to do a video and eventually they will get better at it just like teams get better a building robots. The videos produced this year, at least the sampling I've looked at, are substantially better than in the past.
Teams need to learn how to communicate. I've got a whole thesis on that subject.
As I said, I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing, using old accomplishments. I would prefer to see current accomplishments, though.
I'm going to pick on 1114 here for a minute, just because they're the perennial RCA team that I have the most experience with.
1114 has won RCAs 6 out of the last 7 years, and they currently have their 2009, 2010, and 2011 Chairman's videos on their website, and the 2012 one is expected to be posted soon.
If you watch the three videos that are there, there is a TON of re-used footage, and re-used accomplishments. The 2012 video (which I saw at the GTR East regional after they won the RCA with it), has many of the same accomplishments covered.
I would agree that older accomplishments ARE getting smaller mentions as time passes, which I think is the correct approach, though one in specific struck me as kind of odd this year.
1114 is responsible for FLL kits getting into every Niagara district elementary school. That's a fantastic accomplishment, and one to be proud of for sure. As someone who didn't know that this accomplishment was actually a couple years old already, Karthik's speeches, and their 2012 video made it seem to me as though that was an accomplishment this year. I don't think their intention was to mislead, but I certainly assumed that it was a 2012 accomplishment, until I started watching their older Chairman's videos. Perhaps such things should be presented with dates or something. I don't really know, maybe I'm picking on something that is by-and-large a non-issue.
I'm not saying that they don't continue to do great things, or don't deserve to be winning RCAs perennially, in fact, I know it to be quite the opposite. They ARE probably the most deserving team in the region. They DO continue to sustain many of the efforts mentioned, and they DO continue to do new and exciting things in the community-at-large. I just don't like the feeling I get from the videos that seem to make it sound as though certain accomplishments are 'current' when they are older, whether or not that interpretation was intentionally easy to make.
I don't want to derail the good discussion that's happening here, but I just wanted to clear something up.
I would agree that older accomplishments ARE getting smaller mentions as time passes, which I think is the correct approach, though one in specific struck me as kind of odd this year.
1114 is responsible for FLL kits getting into every Niagara district elementary school. That's a fantastic accomplishment, and one to be proud of for sure. As someone who didn't know that this accomplishment was actually a couple years old already, Karthik's speeches, and their 2012 video made it seem to me as though that was an accomplishment this year. I don't think their intention was to mislead, but I certainly assumed that it was a 2012 accomplishment, until I started watching their older Chairman's videos. Perhaps such things should be presented with dates or something. I don't really know, maybe I'm picking on something that is by-and-large a non-issue.
If you had read the essay and seen the presentation, you most likely would not have gotten this impression. The work put into convincing our school board to invest in robotics kits for every school is a very proud part of our history. However the essay and presentation focus more on what we've done with those kits since their implementation, namely the summer of 2011 project our students undertook, designing a new 5 hour robotics curriculum module, utilizing these kits, for the Grade 7 & 8 design centres.
waialua359
13-04-2012, 19:46
I don't agree. I have not done any real survey but I have know RCA judges to say they they don't and have not watched the video.
I think the RCA teams need to do a video and eventually they will get better at it just like teams get better a building robots. The videos produced this year, at least the sampling I've looked at, are substantially better than in the past.
Teams need to learn how to communicate. I've got a whole thesis on that subject.
Ed,
I cant tell if you agree with me or not.
I have had several different CA judges at 3 different regionals see our video.
I'm not saying they shouldnt do one.....I'm saying they should and it should have weight in the decision made to award a team.:)
Ed,
I cant tell if you agree with me or not.
I have had several different CA judges at 3 different regionals see our video.
I'm not saying they shouldnt do one.....I'm saying they should and it should have weight in the decision made to award a team.:)
It is my understanding that the reason FIRST implemented the video thing in the 1st place was to provide a way for teams to communicate how they pursue Chairman's.
That was the idea. The reality was FIRST found out how much difficulty students have creating a watchable video that is 'on task'.
They could have abandoned the idea but have chosen to keep it. I agree with keeping it. I think it will take 5 or more years for enough teams to wrap their head around how to properly produce a video.
It is taking a lot longer to get this off the ground than some people realized.
I don't think we are at the point where we should require judges to consider the video in their judging, especially considering that was not the original purpose of the video in the 1st place.
Bottom line: they should do a video, but I want to wait a couple of more years before we require it to be adjudicated.
I sometimes question this for several reasons, one of which IMO, FIRST didnt deliver when it came to promoting its goals at its highest moment this year.
I want to follow on this comment one more time. I’m assuming “highest moment” you are referring to is the visit to the White House on February 7, 2012.
Yes, FIRST really messed this one up. The 2011 CA team should have been there, absolutely no doubt. How they made the decisions they did I have no clue !
Why is this important and to whom ?
The event was symbolically important to the generic STEM community. It signals to the world that the White House views STEM activities as important. That is the power of the bully pulpit. But there are real limitations.
Most Americans view the president as the all-powerful authoritative man who governs the country as he pleases from his oval office. The existing situation regarding the presidency and his power is actually on the contrary according to presidential scholars.
President Truman once said of President Eisenhower upon his election, "He'll sit there all day saying do this, do that, and nothing will happen. Poor Ike, it won’t be a bit like the military. He'll find it very frustrating."
After enormous effort preparing to go there, arriving, participating, and returning, we ask ourselves what are the outcomes ? From a public policy perspective it has some importance ( subject to President Truman’s comments ). The President seemed to really enjoy himself, getting away from the headaches of daily life, foreign policy, the economy, etc. From a personal, team, or local perspective it isn’t so impactful. There were maybe 100+ students there.
The White House event was a public policy moment. For the White House, for FIRST, the team, and other STEM stakeholders, pure and simple. Each of these parties have a strong case for making a public policy statement. This is important because......
Sure, the trip was important for helping build a public policy case for supporting STEM education. The White House trip was important and our trip to the Congressional briefing on 2010 was also. We went as public policy pawns, and there is nothing wrong with that. ( In reality the President has probably had a bigger STEM impact with Race to the Top. But will.i.am has probably done a better job of attracting students to FIRST than the President. )
I would strongly caution anyone from assuming it is the “high point of our life or career”. I would double that caution when describing it as the highest moment of FIRST. In fact I will state unequivocally here and now that it isn’t the highest moment of FIRST. It even doesn’t even come close.
The highest moment of FIRST is the profound and life changing moments that thousands students are experiencing right now. Nothing, absolutely nothing about the White House experience even comes close !!
epilogue: If you watch our Chairman's video we talk about the 120+ events we have done. A ton of working in the sphere of public policy, working on the culture, attitudes, etc. We have students that have been doing these things for as long as four years. It has led to a saying on the team "another day in the life of kell robotics". Not to discount the WH experience, it really did feel like "another day in the life ....."
waialua359
13-04-2012, 20:53
I want to follow on this comment one more time. I’m assuming “highest moment” you are referring to is the visit to the White House on February 7, 2012.
Yes, FIRST really messed this one up. The 2011 CA team should have been there, absolutely no doubt. How they made the decisions they did I have no clue !
Why is this important and to whom ?
The event was symbolically important to the generic STEM community. It signals to the world that the White House views STEM activities as important. That is the power of the bully pulpit. But there are real limitations.
Most Americans view the president as the all-powerful authoritative man who governs the country as he pleases from his oval office. The existing situation regarding the presidency and his power is actually on the contrary according to presidential scholars.
President Truman once said of President Eisenhower upon his election, "He'll sit there all day saying do this, do that, and nothing will happen. Poor Ike, it won’t be a bit like the military. He'll find it very frustrating."
After enormous effort preparing to go there, arriving, participating, and returning, we ask ourselves what are the outcomes ? From a public policy perspective it has some importance ( subject to President Truman’s comments ). The President seemed to really enjoy himself, getting away from the headaches of daily life, foreign policy, the economy, etc. From a personal, team, or local perspective it isn’t so impactful. There were maybe 100+ students there.
The White House event was a public policy moment. For the White House, for FIRST, the team, and other STEM stakeholders, pure and simple. Each of these parties have a strong case for making a public policy statement. This is important because......
Sure, the trip was important for helping build a public policy case for supporting STEM education. The White House trip was important and our trip to the Congressional briefing on 2010 was also. We went as public policy pawns, and there is nothing wrong with that. ( In reality the President has probably had a bigger STEM impact with Race to the Top. But will.i.am has probably done a better job of attracting students to FIRST than the President. )
I would strongly caution anyone from assuming it is the “high point of our life or career”. I would double that caution when describing it as the highest moment of FIRST. In fact I will state unequivocally here and now that it isn’t the highest moment of FIRST. It even doesn’t even come close.
The highest moment of FIRST is the profound and life changing moments that thousands students are experiencing right now. Nothing, absolutely nothing about the White House experience even comes close !!
epilogue: If you watch our Chairman's video we talk about the 120+ events we have done. A ton of working in the sphere of public policy, working on the culture, attitudes, etc. We have students that have been doing these things for as long as four years. It has led to a saying on the team "another day in the life of kell robotics". Not to discount the WH experience, it really did feel like "another day in the life ....."
Ed,
First of all, thanks for sharing in detail. I hear you and totally understand.
And yes, it is what I was referring to.
Without getting into detail (something we can one day talk about face-face), my whole issue is the message they send to all of us, regardless of the impact it really has.
I can give tons of analogies about our experiences while working with our local government and agencies, sponsors, and the news media about the concerns you bring up and to what extent it has towards the stakeholders.
Does it really matter for concerns you bring up? Is it something we have control of?
When people, colleagues, friends, families and business leaders see what the goals of FIRST are, explicitly stated, and see actions that say essentially "Winning is everything," how would you explain that?
Regardless of any event that happens external to our team, we have reasons why we do what we do for our participation in FIRST.
The best personal example is this season, as we have done arguably more than any other year, and not even applying for an RCA.
mathking
13-04-2012, 22:21
From a team's vantage point, the best way to demonstrate impact is through documentation. Take lots of pictures and get written feedback. Make scrapbooks of events, news items, flyers, etc. Leave the notebooks in your pit area and allow other teams to look through them.
This is really, really good advice. Not just for purposes of documenting your Chairman's Award submissions but also for preserving your history. We did not do a great job of this in our first few years. (This was a comment we got a few times in our CA feedback.) Now we do a better job, and are trying to recapture our "lost" history as well. This year we started building an iBook that we hope to use it going forward to document our efforts. It was a fun project for me, because I got to reminisce about the past teams. It was great for the kids because many of them learned things about the team's earlier years they did not know. It is also making us think about our future, and focus more on plans. (That was also some of the constructive feedback we got from judges this year.)
We have also made a strong effort to keep track of our alumni, and this definitely has impressed judges. It also gives us a some hard data that is nice to have in the presentations. (I think that we also have an unfair advantage here, given that so many of our alumni go to Ohio State, which is local, and come back and mentor our team or other OSU supported teams. But it is something that is much easier to do in the Facebook era.)
We always struggle with what to include and what not to include. I try to push the kids to focus on the ongoing efforts, the things we do every year. The special things are great, but we try to emphasize the things we did while at least some of the current team members were members. Once your team has been around for a while, and has started getting serious about its FIRST mission, you will have lots of accomplishments. Sometimes those read like a laundry list. My advice is cut down on the number and focus on the ones of which you are the most proud and which best represent what your team has done.
For the past 8 years we have put together e-week (Engineering Week) lessons for elementary school (4th-6th grade) teachers. It does not take a huge effort. We have a few kids do some research and settle on an engineering activity. We write up a lesson plan and then offer the lessons as well as supplies to interested local teachers. A few hours work for a few kids (at least now that we don't try the counterproductive route of making thousands of individual kits and instead focus on classroom sets) and a couple hundred bucks (at most, this year was less). We have given away as many as 9600 kids worth of kits and as few as 800. This year was, I believe, around 2000. It is not something to rival helping to start up a regional or finding thousands of dollars to start new teams. But it is something that we do every year, and it has become one of "our things." So their are kids on the team who can talk intelligently about it when judges come around to our pits.
On a more philosophical level, I recently changed my signature to: "I always tell the kids, when you don't win the Chairman's Award that's not a bad thing. If you think you are deserving, but someone else is better, that mean's the message of FIRST is really getting out there." That is what I try to communicate to the kids. Other than this year, we probably had our strongest submission in 2010. (To my mind we were more "deserving" in 2010 than in 2009, when we won.) But 291 won the award. I talked a lot with one of their mentors and a bunch of their kids, and I had absolutely no doubt they deserved the win. There was another year (2008 I think) when 612 won, and I remember a couple of our kids saying "Could we ever be that good?" after talking with 612 about their efforts.
On to some of the good ideas. I will try (can't promise, because things are busy right now with trying to organize the trip to the Championships and negotiate the start of track & field season) to have our presentation record a practice presentation and post that to the web. I think this is a good idea. (When we publish our iBook it will have a lot about what we have done, and will include the presentation and team essay.) In our annual training day one of the sessions is about the Chairman's Award submission. I strongly encourage everyone to submit at least occasionally, even if you *know* you can't win. As other posters have mentioned, the process is valuable in itself. Almost every year, when we are rereading the essay or the kids are practicing the presentation, we reach some conclusions about things we will do differently the next time.
Levansic
14-04-2012, 00:23
This year we started building an iBook that we hope to use it going forward to document our efforts. It was a fun project for me, because I got to reminisce about the past teams. It was great for the kids because many of them learned things about the team's earlier years they did not know. It is also making us think about our future, and focus more on plans. (That was also some of the constructive feedback we got from judges this year.)
-- snip --
... (When we publish our iBook it will have a lot about what we have done, and will include the presentation and team essay.)
Our team put together an iBook this year, to better describe the team and it's works over the last two years, to other schools without teams, potential donors, and parents. This rich media is awesome, and it puts to shame our essay and video that we submitted for the Chairman's award.
Producing the iBook gave us the chance to do some team archeology, as we put summary pages together for each year our team was in existence. Some years, the team existed and competed, but left no trace. Most years, there was a team picture and a description of that year's robot, but not much more. Our last three years were heavily documented, and the competition robot was the least notable item. Our team's progression moved from focus on the game to focus on philosophical tenets of the team, and how they are used to enhance STEM education. I like to see this as a maturation, and a better match with the goals of FIRST.
We haven't published the iBook to the iBook store yet, but it resides on every iPad that graces our pit. We are quite proud of it, and would highly encourage teams to investigate this media.
--Len
Another reason to submit a Chairman’s essay:
Few students join the robotics team because they want to create and perform a five minute presentation to a panel of judges. Yet, those who do wind up on the Chairman’s sub team seem to acquire skills and confidence that are priceless.
Just as teams recruit engineers to mentor the design and building of a robot, we had sought professionals who have expertise in making presentations.
Just one example:
When Cynthia was on the Chairman committee, we asked one of our sponsors, a major bank, if there was someone who could help the team with our presentation. A pair of major executives offered to help. Their help wound up being several meetings and “lunches” at some very nice restaurants. The tips on improving the presentation were invaluable, but the friendship and exposure to executive work was eye opening for the kids.
Cynthia, who graduated and went to ASU’s college of construction, felt a bit out of place, being a rare woman in the program and just about the only Hispanic. A few months into her freshman year, one of the professors asked her if she would be willing to help make a presentation to one of the colleges major contributors. She replied that she would but wondered why she was being recruited. The professor replied, “You went through FIRST and have experience with presentations and we need a student we can count on.” She was on the faculty team and they got their grant. Cynthia graduated last year and is now a project manager building a new Intel plant in Arizona. Her exposure to executives who are decision makers was as important than her exposure to engineers.
Preparing and delivering a Chairman’s presentation can be an authentic, important, life-altering experience that few students experience. It is perhaps more valuable than building the robot. It really matters little if the team wins the trophy… it’s the experience.
I think what's really needed for the Chairman's Award is some form of peer review. The judges aren't in a position to determine the amount of creative embellishment in those essays and presentations nor do they have time to do so. As a previous poster mentioned, can they can't always figure out the timeline of things a team does.
I'd like to see every essay posted for public comment before the regional. Maybe the only ones who are able to comment are the folks so designated by the coach in TIMs, similar to award submitters and then only on essays from teams at their regional. Those folks could make both positive and corrective comments on others teams essays in a forum.
Those comments would then be available to the judges and give them topics to ask the team about during their interview or in the pits. I'm not sure if the team should be able to see the comments. Just the fact that teams knew their essay would be public and could be commented on would cut down a lot on the exaggeration we see in some of the essays. The judges shouldn't take any comment as gospel but merely a place to start a conversation and maybe then only if they kept hearing the same thing from multiple sources.
Obviously there is room for mischief here with competing teams tearing apart one another's essays. It might be best if they needed to be approved by the main TIMs contact or their designate before they could be posted.
Another thing that I think would be a helpful requirement is a timeline as part of the submission. This wouldn't come out of your character limit but might be part of the executive summary's teams fill out. It would be a bullet list of things the team has done broken out by year.
Preparing and delivering a Chairman’s presentation can be an authentic, important, life-altering experience that few students experience. It is perhaps more valuable than building the robot.
This is so true. These are the same skills used for college, internship and job interviews. I've done a few workshops over the past 3 years on "Warm Up to Judging" for both FRC and VRC. Although there is always discussion at these workshops about the individual awards, it is mostly about the elevator pitch, interview best practices, and how to organize thoughts/information.
NEMO has a resource paper on "PACE yourself for that interview" about job interviews - written by someone who hires. http://www.firstnemo.org/resources.htm
I have a ppt posted on Judging with the notes. The last part is about the RCA. I listened to the National Judge Advisors talk about the 2012 RCA on the Senior Mentor posted call last fall and incorporated my notes into this presentation. This is their advice. http://www.mdfirst.org/images/stories/documents2011/2012_Judging_101.pdf
mathking
14-04-2012, 19:40
Our team put together an iBook this year, to better describe the team and it's works over the last two years, to other schools without teams, potential donors, and parents. This rich media is awesome, and it puts to shame our essay and video that we submitted for the Chairman's award.
Producing the iBook gave us the chance to do some team archeology, as we put summary pages together for each year our team was in existence. Some years, the team existed and competed, but left no trace. Most years, there was a team picture and a description of that year's robot, but not much more. Our last three years were heavily documented, and the competition robot was the least notable item. Our team's progression moved from focus on the game to focus on philosophical tenets of the team, and how they are used to enhance STEM education. I like to see this as a maturation, and a better match with the goals of FIRST.
We haven't published the iBook to the iBook store yet, but it resides on every iPad that graces our pit. We are quite proud of it, and would highly encourage teams to investigate this media.
--Len
We are in the same boat. We had the preview version to show other teams and judges, but we are waiting until after the Championships to publish it. We too had to do some archeology on our history. (I am the only person who has been on the team for all ten seasons.) We have at least some photos and remembrances of each season. As we went along gathering data we got more and more stuff collected. We hope to get every alumnus of the team to contribute a short bio.
et, those who do wind up on the Chairman’s sub team seem to acquire skills and confidence that are priceless.
This is absolutely true. I tell my students all the time that they are not really going to be judged on how competent they are and how good their ideas are. Rather they will be judged based on how competent others perceive them to be and on how effectively they communicate their ideas. If you are good at developing and/or presenting proposals to clients, you will make yourself a valuable employee.
Akash Rastogi
15-04-2012, 10:43
I think what's really needed for the Chairman's Award is some form of peer review. The judges aren't in a position to determine the amount of creative embellishment in those essays and presentations nor do they have time to do so. As a previous poster mentioned, can they can't always figure out the timeline of things a team does.
I wholeheartedly agree with this.
Joanne Talmage
15-04-2012, 12:08
Our team, the NASA Knights, learned from other teams a long time ago that if you do the right things, good things will naturally follow. The teams that we admired were always helpful because they wanted to be, listened because they cared, and had a great time learning and sharing even when their robot did not perform well. Our motto then became to "Inspire at all costs, not win at all costs." It has made our time on the team a wonderful, exhilarating experience that supercedes the winning of an award. We have more fun while helping others when we can because we believe it is the right thing to do. We have formed many treasured friendships and that is what we will always remember. The Chairman's award is an honorable award but so are the qualities of the team that receives it for doing the right things. I have found many desirable qualities in all teams that I have encountered over the last 15 years. The fact that you are trying to be inspirational for the award proves that you will one day succeed as long as you do the right things for the right reasons.:)
Katie_UPS
15-04-2012, 23:02
I think what's really needed for the Chairman's Award is some form of peer review. The judges aren't in a position to determine the amount of creative embellishment in those essays and presentations nor do they have time to do so. As a previous poster mentioned, can they can't always figure out the timeline of things a team does.
I feel like this would put teams in a lose-lose situation. If a team calls you out for lying (whether you did or not), then you're chances are ruined. And by the same token, calling out a team puts you(r team) at risk for being called "un-GP".
Also, malicious teams would ruin the system, because not everyone is a okay with losing (even if its to the better-prepared opponent), and although GP operates under the ideal of adjusting the average by bringing the floor up (instead of the top down), some teams still don't get that.
That's why I'd suggest the main contact for the commenting team be the gatekeeper for comments. Again these comments would just be for the benefit of the judges to drill down a bit deeper in one area or another. They could also be confirmation that a team did a good job on this or that.
At the very least I like what FIRST was trying to do this year but didn't pull off where every team's chairman's award and video (or maybe it was just the winners) was published after the fact.
dtengineering
16-04-2012, 02:25
I think what's really needed for the Chairman's Award is some form of peer review. The judges aren't in a position to determine the amount of creative embellishment in those essays and presentations nor do they have time to do so. As a previous poster mentioned, can they can't always figure out the timeline of things a team does.
While I cannot, of course, speak for every regional I can say that my experience as a judge for the past two years in Seattle has confirmed every hope and expectation that I had when I coached/mentored a team. The judges are just as critical, dedicated and determined as you would expect.
Specifically, I have had the honour of being on the RCA judging panel the past two years and am pleased to assure everyone that we are well aware of the significance of the RCA.
Teams that have won have tended to do a very good job of documenting their accomplishments with thank you letters, event invitations, photographs, media clippings... in fact, I would tend to say that for true RCA contending teams the issue is not one of "how do we embellish our accomplishments", but rather one of "which ones do we leave out" due to space and time limitations. We have never been in need of "fact checking" due to the documentaiton provided by teams, but do go through the top few applications with a fine-toothed comb. I can't speak for my colleages on the panel, but if a team were found to be playing fast-and-loose with the truth it would be a quick and easy way to eliminate them from contention.
I appreciate the concern being expressed in this thread... and would not oppose seeing winning RCA submissions published in an open forum. I question the need to do this formally, as I doubt there is an RCA winning team that would hesitate to share their documentation at the end of the season if asked politely. (We never won RCA, but we often published our submission on our website anyway...)
However I do wish to reassure people that the judges did not just fall off the back of a turnip truck...
Jason
AllenGregoryIV
16-04-2012, 06:37
I appreciate the concern being expressed in this thread... and would not oppose seeing winning RCA submissions published in an open forum. I question the need to do this formally, as I doubt there is an RCA winning team that would hesitate to share their documentation at the end of the season if asked politely. (We never won RCA, but we often published our submission on our website anyway...)
I like this idea solely so teams can see all the accomplishments of the Chairman's teams so they can learn from them and be inspired. A good portion of the submissions end up being posted anyway but they are just so scattered it's hard to find. We need a website like The Mobius (http://themobius.wordpress.com) but for Chairman's teams.
Akash Rastogi
16-04-2012, 07:24
I appreciate the concern being expressed in this thread... and would not oppose seeing winning RCA submissions published in an open forum. I question the need to do this formally, as I doubt there is an RCA winning team that would hesitate to share their documentation at the end of the season if asked politely. (We never won RCA, but we often published our submission on our website anyway...)
I can assure you there are RCA winning teams who have explicitly told me they don't publish essays online when I inquired about it. I will not mention team numbers. This is something I feel is against the spirit of the award.
I can assure you there are RCA winning teams who have explicitly told me they don't publish essays online when I inquired about it. I will not mention team numbers. This is something I feel is against the spirit of the award.While I personally agree with you (and am not implying you think the following), I do want to point out that not publishing the essay =/= team maybe lied in the essay. I do know teams that are more than willing to share their documentation (photos, raw video, articles, testimonials, etc), but like to keep their writing style under-wraps. I have even been informed of this reason directly.
The style of the essay itself can be incredibly unique and beneficial to a team's chances, so I can understand why teams wouldn't want to see their style imitated (even in the most benign interests) but have no problem sharing the content.
emusteve
16-04-2012, 11:02
This would probably have been more relevant earlier on in the discussion, but I just discovered this thread, so here goes...
Going back to the original post, our team had a direct experience with having another team claiming responsibility for an event we initiated, paid for the venue, sent the invitations, set-up, supervised, etc. We included it in our Chairman's submission. The other team had their presentation scheduled before ours. When our kids made their presentation, the Judges told our kids to "Be more original, and DON'T COPY TEAM XXX!"
This infuriated the Mentors, but we're not allowed to defend our kids, even if we DO have the receipts and pictures. The Mentors quietly steamed, while the kids morale dropped to a new low. But everyone was gracious, and didn't say a word. We just sat and applauded as the other team was awarded Chairman's.
I relate this simply to illustrate and inform how deeply such an incident can affect a team. We haven't submitted a Chairman's application since. It just hasn't meant that much to us.
We're not a large team, and we're hardly ever noticed, even though we do lots of good things. We don't have a large quantity of projects in any one year, just not enough time. (Though we have quite an accumulation over time, I've always been under the impression a team should only submit their activities for the past year. Otherwise, you're just riding on the backs of your previous member's accomplishments.)
It's taken many years, and two generations of students, for the effects to fade enough for students to start to talk about making a Chairman's submission, and to look at some of the ones from the past. Perhaps we'll submit one in the coming season.
The one award that has always meant the most to me personally (meant more even than winning Engineering Inspiration), was the year we won the Johnson and Johnson Sportsmanship Award, because that speaks directly to the character of our Team and Students.
Feedback encouraged.
Teams that have won have tended to do a very good job of documenting their accomplishments with thank you letters, event invitations, photographs, media clippings... in fact, I would tend to say that for true RCA contending teams the issue is not one of "how do we embellish our accomplishments", but rather one of "which ones do we leave out" due to space and time limitations. We have never been in need of "fact checking" due to the documentaiton provided by teams, but do go through the top few applications with a fine-toothed comb. I can't speak for my colleages on the panel, but if a team were found to be playing fast-and-loose with the truth it would be a quick and easy way to eliminate them from contention.
I'm delighted to hear that the judges in Seattle take their duties so seriously. I'm not sure all regionals Chairman panels dig into the claims made by their top contenders or even how they would do that for out of the area teams. Just the suspicion by students that some claims are exaggerated is reason enough, in my opinion, to let the sunlight in.
Hopefully the Chairman's award is really about what you do in your community, not how you communicate what you do in ten minutes. Teams worried about having their writing style copied are worried about the wrong things.
When our kids made their presentation, the Judges told our kids to "Be more original, and DON'T COPY TEAM XXX!"
When our kids made their presentation at a past regional in another year, the Judges told our kids to "do more community outreach"
in fact, I would tend to say that for true RCA contending teams the issue is not one of "how do we embellish our accomplishments", but rather one of "which ones do we leave out" due to space and time limitations.
So this year we added back in what we took out in a previous year. If you watch what we said between 0:25 and 0:30 here in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-4FA5RBWVg
And we handed them the stack of documents that proved it. It was really annoying having dropped from a prior presentation because of lack of room, time, space, and then being told we didn't do enough community outreach.
The list of events is over a 3+ year period, which was fully disclosed. We will probably do about 30 events this year which is impossible to insert into a RCA submission without a supplemental volume dropped onto the judges desk.
One of my frustrations, Feeling your pain man !
mathking
16-04-2012, 13:31
When we do events with other teams, and this is a lot of our events, we try to stress that to the judges. Our off season event is co-hosted by most of the central Ohio teams, with 4-5 teams all doing a lot of work. We did a rookie kit bot build in cooperation with 3262 from Northland High School and we did a series of demonstrations at the eTech Ohio conference in cooperation with 3264 from Metro High School. We try to get thank you letters,pictures and/or video from our events, in order to document them.
I just told our presentation team to record a practice session for our presentation so that we can put it on our YouTube channel. I think we will plan on trying to do this every year. Hopefully we can include it in the iBook as well. I do want to stress to those trying to learn from the videos that while the formal presentation is important, the Q&A with the judges afterward is just as if not more important.
JaneYoung
16-04-2012, 15:22
A Judge for one of the FLL events in our FIRST community shared an incredible story with me this weekend. It brought home the depth of the Judges' desire to see the teams at their best or to 'catch' them at it. :) It brought home the understanding of the wealth of experience and knowledge that the Judges bring to the table. It brought home the passion that the Judges share among themselves and with the teams during their competitions.
I understand why some folks would like to have an element of Peer Judging in determining the Chairman's Award but I think about the discussions that constantly plague ChiefDelphi regarding mentor led/student led teams and mentor built/student built robots. It makes me sad to think that there are those who want to treat the Chairman's Award with that same mentality, ignoring the caliber of the Judges and what they bring to the event in the way of perspective, knowledge, insight, enthusiasm, and focus.
I've followed this thread closely and my thoughts haven't changed. They are:
1. Continue with your team development and impact on the community - however your team views community
2. Document the process
- create videos and materials for short programs/introductions/interviews
- create videos and materials for longer programs/introductions/interviews
- have them archived and organized, ready to access
- keep your documentation current
- continue to monitor and improve in your team's growth and development
3. Share your knowledge and experiences with other teams, helping them to continue to grow and develop
4. Document the process
Many of us are losing the trust element that is built into the program. The bridge this year has shown us that we have a long way to go to fully understand the importance of the trust element. Micromanaging the Chairman's Award will not do anything of benefit towards helping to balance the bridge on the field or off the field.
Jane
mathking
16-04-2012, 20:37
OK, I am going to paste our Chairman's essay here, and try to show what documentation we provided to back it up.
Ten years ago, 20 students came together because of their passion for science and technology. Today, over 70 students meet 5 times a week to use that passion to build a robot. The original advisor said, “In 2003 when we moved everything from Scioto to Coffman after the season, it fit in the trunk of my Camry. With plenty of room to spare.” Now, looking at our shop, our equipment couldn’t fit into 20 Camry’s. Our focal point is to never forget where we came from and why we first started.
OK, no real documentation here. I was that mentor, and you pretty much have to take my word for how much stuff we have. We do have a couple of pictures of the shop with our documentation, so you can see a lot of the equipment we have.
FIRST is all about spreading science and technology. This year we accomplished this with our outreach projects at our community recreational center and mall. At our rec center, we demoed last year’s robot and had videos and a poster for community members to interact with. We had many kids come up to us and ask us questions—the big robot drew them in, and the technology behind it kept them interested. We heard kids, many of whom had had no prior experience with this type of technology, repeatedly say, “This is sooo cool!!” We knew that this meant that a passion for STEM had been ignited. Watching these kids enjoy our robot was a great reminder that being a FIRST team is more than building a competitive robot.
We made a video of two groups of kids coming up to our robot, asking questions and having team members (including the essay writer) answering questions about the robot.
While at our rec center, we told all of the kids we talked with to join LEGO leagues in the Dublin elementary and middle schools. This is how young members of the community can get involved. Members of our team mentor the 25 middle school teams, that our booster group supports. Realizing the importance of teaching kids at a young age, team members give up their time in order to foster a love for STEM in the kids.
The number of Dublin FLL teams is documented, and we have a number of pictures of mentoring. I think we have at least one picture from each of the past six years. We included a couple pictures we took with one of our FLL teams last year at the Championships (there were an Ambassador team). We also had some pictures of the FLL District event we co-host with our boosters.
The mentors of our team have a tradition of going above and beyond by inspiring us to discover the solutions ourselves. When we ask a question, they respond with a question so we can figure out how to fix the problem on our own. Our student-built robot could not be completed without their expertise and dedication to the team. We find one of their best assets is that so many are FIRST Team 1014 alumni. They know and love this team, which demonstrates the impact FIRST robotics has had on them. This is beneficial because it keeps us in line with the spirit our team had 10 years ago. Mentors from that first year never cease to remind us of why we are here.
Difficult to document. We do have a list of all of our student alumni which we update each season, including what they did after graduation. We were helped this year because a couple of our alumni were at the QCR with other teams they mentor now.
One of our previous mentors left us to start a team in California, but he didn’t leave the FIRST Team 1014 family. Our team has been helping his FIRST Team 4144 with all that we can by using Skype and multiple telephone calls. In this same spirit of helping, our team focuses on starting up new teams. We held a training day to teach rookie teams and new members of veteran teams, including ours, about wiring, programming, mechanical systems, the Chairman’s Award, and mentoring. FIRST Teams 3324, 677, 4142, 4145, 3591, 3484, 1317, 3262, 1008 attended, along with our own team. This past year we also demoed our robot at St. Charles to spark interest there, which we did successfully. We helped them start FIRST Team 4269 this year, and they were mentored by our Ohio State sister team 677 this build season.
We had a thank you email from St. Charles thanking us for coming to do the demonstration. We had a number of pictures from our training day, and a couple of thank you email letters from team mentors. We dropped the ball on having an email from 4144, but we did have that mentor, back on spring break, attending the regional.
Our team co-founded CORI (Central Ohio Robotics Initiative), with whom we held a kick-off day this year. On this day we teamed up with FIRST Team 3262 to help rookie teams 4145, 4269, 4085, 4142, 4121, and 4283 construct a kit bot. CORI’s goal is to start new robotics teams in Central Ohio, which is a value FIRST Team 1014 has had from the beginning.
We had a number of pictures of this event, with a focus on getting the attending rookies teams as well as team members from 3262. It would have been even better if we had been at the same regional as 3262, but they went to Buckeye.
We also make an effort to reach the kids of Dublin during eWeek. We send over 2,000 kits to all 4th and 5th graders in the district including lesson plans for the teachers, always pertaining to STEM fields. This year, we had kids build a “roller coaster” for a marble in order to explore concepts pertaining to energy. We also have the kids working in groups to encourage collaboration and coopertition.
We had copies of the lesson plans, a couple thank you emails from teachers, and a video of the previous year's activity being done in a classroom. We should have video of this year's activity being done when we go to competition next year.
The Dublin community has taken an interest in us as well. We were filmed by the community TV channel to demonstrate what FIRST is. We participate in Dublin’s 4th of July parade, where we distribute any left over eWeek kits that we have and demonstrate the robot. We have bins around the community to collect old cell phones and encourage recycling technology. Also, we get involved in the Dublin Coffman dodgeball tournament, which this year is trying to raise $6000 for Pancreatic Cancer. Our robot will shoot dodge balls during the finals in front of the school. At events like these, the community realizes how important technology is. And, more importantly, our team realizes how important it is to reach out and use our talents in situations that aren’t STEM-focused to help society and spread science and technology.
First off, full disclosure - the dodge balls DO NOT exactly fly out of our robot. More like dribble. They are too soft and not quite large enough. We had a copy of the TV spot, pictures from the parade and of the many recycling boxes.
The partnerships we have made with the companies Buildmore and Tubular are very important to us. Buildmore donates their workshop to us so we can use tools, such as the CNC mill they own, and Tubular is the company we send the plans for our chassis so they can weld it. Since the 2002 team, our partnerships have expanded. This year we have even gained some help from EWI, the Edison Welding Institute, where some members of the team took welding lessons. Relationships with these companies amongst many others encourage us to build our best robot ever.
We have some pictures here, but need more documentation.
For 10 years now we have been FIRST Team 1014: Bad Robot. We have become a highly competitive team in the arena, getting better and better technically every year. However, in this is not what we pride ourselves most. Rather, it’s how we’ve kept our focus throughout all the ups and down. Taking this year to reminisce over the last 10 years has served to keep our focus on our future. FIRST robotics is not about having a winning robot—it’s about using our skills in science and technology to improve our community, and about spreading the word that science and technology are important. As of now, FIRST Team 1014 has 10 years of building robots and sharing our technological values under our belt, and for the next 10 years we plan to continue and expand our traditions.
This year having the iBook really helped with the documentation process. While we did not include things like copies of letters, pictures and videos to document things are on the iBook, and so easy to show to judges. I also note that we had a number of things that we did not put in the essay, or did not put in the presentation. For example, the essay made no mention of co-hosting the Connect A Million Minds Invitational (June 23, 2012 - Dublin Coffman High School, only $50, air conditioned, spots filling up fast), the Dublin FLL District tournament or the new Dublin Engineering Academy which a cooperative venture with Metro High School (3264).
The CocoNuts Team 2486 will be presenting their Chairman's Interview Presentation to any one who is interested at Championships. We will be presenting at lunch on Thursday, and the location is TBD.
We want everyone to know what we do and to be able to ask us questions about any of our work. We also want to invite other teams to present if they would like to and if time allows.
We will be posting flyers in the pits, and I will post as soon as we have decided on a location. We really hope to see everyone there! :)
AllenGregoryIV
24-04-2012, 17:49
The CocoNuts Team 2486 will be presenting their Chairman's Interview Presentation to any one who is interested at Championships. We will be presenting at lunch on Thursday, and the location is TBD.
We want everyone to know what we do and to be able to ask us questions about any of our work. We also want to invite other teams to present if they would like to and if time allows.
We will be posting flyers in the pits, and I will post as soon as we have decided on a location. We really hope to see everyone there! :)
Lunch on Thursday is the same time as the "Chairman's Award Chat 2012 - Panel Discussion with Championship Chairman's Award Winning Teams"
A lot of teams interested in Chairman's award stuff will be there, you might want to find a time that doesn't conflict.
Oh darn. I'd forgotten about that! We will probably reschedule then for Friday at lunch. Sorry about that.
We will be doing our Chairman's Award Presentation Exchange at 10am in the upstairs area of the America Center. We hope to see you there!
vBulletin® v3.6.4, Copyright ©2000-2017, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.