[FRC Blog] Two Championship Survey Results and Path Forward

[JesseK]

From an economics perspective, "bang for the buck" if you will...the split reduces the bang. And while it is still a year away, I've already sensed a reduction in the desire to raise funds by our team.

Anyone under the illusion that FRC is meant to be the best bang for the buck STEM education initiative needs to have their eyes opened. For raw STEM, maybe 20 kids get continued valuable experience throughout the school year. Another 20-40 get exposure from the shop and robot, another 20-40 from the business side of managing a technical team, then who knows how many other 'passers-by' via outreach. From the flip side, your 'bang' is reduced but perhaps another team's 'bang' skyrockets. Personally, the only anecdotes I've heard are from teams who want a second competition period, who cares if it's Champs.

Using the same budget as our FRC team, we could start 12 5-person FTC/VEX teams and know that those kids, even though they probably won't make it as far in competition or their robots aren't as good, could possibly holistically get more out of the process of the smaller robot competitions. According to the incoming VRC kids in 7-8th grade, we would get more student inspiration value from the VRC competitions (but maybe that's just Virginia...).

Yet my program has done that for 4 years now. 4 years of 8-11 FTC teams with 6-10 kids each has taught us that there is no equivalent to FRC from a raw STEM perspective (or even a student-led business perspective...). Even in FTC, where the students have creative freedom in custom materials, this is true. The FTC students are far less prepared to make their own puzzle pieces in life than the FRC students. The difference is mentorship (ok ... and kinetic energy...). It is far easier to get 8-11 mentors to guide 80-ish students to ONE goal than it is for them to guide them to 8+ different goals. FTC robots are also less likely to explode. (Kerbal reference...)

At the moment FRC (and more specifically, FIRST's progression of programs JrFLL->FLL->FRC or FTC) has no equivalent. Perhaps that's a problem, or perhaps FIRST needs to vet out the details of the 'crazier' ideas (the best ideas have a little crazy...) before moving on them.

Or, IMO, perhaps they're not reading the tea leaves correctly because their questions are biased to give them the answers they want, rather than the answers that exist. For example, I suspect there is very LITTLE progression from FTC to FRC and yet as the TIMS contact for 8 FTC and 1 FRC team I have never seen a survey question on it.

[HP42S]

FTC will only become important to FIRST once we see a viable competitor to FRC. My tea leaves predict all this 2 championship and 25% of teams must attend nonsense will die because the market will open and money talks.

[Rman1923]

I think FIRST would have to pay for it. No team has enough $ reserves to pay for a second trip on one week's notice. I expect it would cost about $150,000 for 4 alliances. That's less than 1 Regional (in California at least).

Yeah, again this is the best way to do it, but it looks like FIRST has to pay for two champs as well as the winners' travel so it may just be lightly subsidized rather than the whole thing. They would probably only pay just for drive team, 3 pit crew, adviser and robot travel costs.

[Madison]

I think FIRST would have to pay for it. No team has enough $ reserves to pay for a second trip on one week's notice. I expect it would cost about $150,000 for 4 alliances. That's less than 1 Regional (in California at least).

We do. I can't imagine we're alone.

Not saying we'd be excited about it -- it'd be exhausting and, mostly, a giant waste of time and money -- but it wouldn't be impossible.

[JB987]

For those who think their team could handle the extra expense and the logistic challenges (even with some FIRST assistance) of a special additional event to identify 'one champion' on a one week notice...have you considered how many school districts require requests for travel be placed weeks/months prior to travel?

[hunterteam3476]

Another thing to think about is your volunteers...... Your not going to have the same man power for 3 weeks back to back.....

[Foster]

Heavy Sigh.
....
My Decision Theory Professor would put heavy red marks all across this blog post and give it a 'D' as a paper. She might not have even accepted the original survey for turn-in. '5' cannot be 'neutral' if there are 4 options below it representing 'against' and 5 options above it representing 'for'. There is also no analysis given for whether or not the survey represents statistical significance, but I applaud the effort to analyze on a per-team basis (just keep in mind that 5.2 isn't "in favor"...).


Super, you are the guy we are looking for. Put together a poll with similar questions, but the correct range of possible answers. Then post it on survey monkey and put the link here. Take results for 10 days and report back your findings!!

[Citrus Dad]

For the first time I can ever recall in the team's history (since 2002), and I've been around for a lot of it (since 2003), we are seriously considering taking the energies/focus/resources off of FRC and putting them into something else. There are a lot of reasons for this but believe me when I tell you that this notion of a split championship has been a catalyst for having these conversations. Striving to be the best in the world at something is a huge driver for us. Removing that goal (or adding more if you prefer looking at it that way) is demotivating.

If a team like 900 is this far down the road to operationalize a response to championsplit, then a lot of other teams may not be far behind. FIRST HQ claimed a primary purpose was to give more teams exposure to elite teams. What if those elite teams no longer want to bother to attend?

[gblake]

If a team like 900 is this far down the road to operationalize a response to championsplit, then a lot of other teams may not be far behind. FIRST HQ claimed a primary purpose was to give more teams exposure to elite teams. What if those elite teams no longer want to bother to attend?What the person from Team 900 posted is glowing evidence of FIRST's success.

According what we read here, they are considering graduating from having their FRC blinders on, and are now thinking about all STEM programs, and specifically about which one(s) is best for the students and the community they serve.

What, pray tell, could be better for them than doing that????

Blake

[Citrus Dad]

Also since FIRST is paying attention to our solutions, as a community we have the ability to propose and debate the merits of new ideas. Apart from the two locations, FIRST has made it fairly clear that details still need to be worked out. While there may be pains right now, I believe ultimately it will work out for the best.

FIRST HQ appears to be pretty much ignoring any proposals from the FRC community up to this point other than "we might bring together the championsplit winners at a later date..."

[Citrus Dad]

What the person from Team 900 posted is glowing evidence of FIRST's success.

According what we read here, they are considering graduating from having their FRC blinders on, and are now thinking about all STEM programs, and specifically about which one(s) is best for the students and the community they serve.

What, pray tell, could be better for them than doing that????

Blake

So the aim of FIRST is to make FRC obsolete? That's an odd goal.

[gblake]

So the aim of FIRST is to make FRC obsolete? That's an odd goal.No, the aim of FIRST is adequately (IMO) summarized as inspiring students to pursue STEM careers.

[Citrus Dad]

So you're not going to try and win just because there are two championships? Having to share the championship title with 7 other teams instead of 3 other teams will change your motivations as a team? You'll no longer have any drive towards success if you can only win in Houston and not Detroit?

This question has been asked answered on a number of threads over the last month. And the answer is always the same: the difference in incentives results in differences in outcomes, even if that difference isn't obvious to you.

[Citrus Dad]

I don't have anything of statistical significance, no. I did text a few members of my senior class on 116 if they remember who won in 2007, and none of them did (with the exception of me, if that counts). One of them had even returned to mentor 116 afterwards.

I can safely say that the majority of the members on our team remember who won champs a number of years back. When I started mentoring in 2012, our team had only been to champs once, but I was impressed at how many students knew who the alliance captains and top teams had been back for a number of years. And our alumni members appear to retain much of that knowledge.

Of course now my sample is biased, but I've developed substantial contacts with both students and mentors across Northern California. The knowledge of the students I talk with about the competitive history is impressive.

And I'll give the counterexample from my own sports experience. I used to follow track & field closely (and still compete after 40+ years.) I may not have been able to immediately recall who won a particular championship 2 years before, but I could with just a little prompting. And regardless, I cared a great deal about the competition as it happened. Kamen's reasoning is faulty if he's using recall ability as a standard for caring about the competition. It's a false metric.

[AlexanderTheOK]

I suspect there is very LITTLE progression from FTC to FRC

Heck, I don't even think my area HAS any FTC teams. Progression around here is generally FLL -> VEX -> FRC.

[grstex]

So the aim of FIRST is to make FRC obsolete? That's an odd goal.

In a word, yes. My hunch is that FIRST would like to become obsolete the same way the Susan G. Komen Foundation would like to become obsolete.

Honestly, if Marshall and his team feels their students are ready for a bigger challenge that FRC, they should be commended. Especially if it leaves them more interested in STEM fields and more prepared for college and a career.

[cadandcookies]

So the aim of FIRST is to make FRC obsolete? That's an odd goal.

While I disagree somewhat with how Blake phrases it, I'm all for teams serving their communities the best they possibly can, whether that's via FIRST or not. In my community, I know that splitting Championships has little to no effect on our considerations for how well we're serving our community. In other areas that might not be the case, and certainly any team that feels that there is a better program out there for their communities unique set of needs (inspiration, building technical skills, building life skills, etc) shouldn't be blinded by some illusion that they need to do FRC to be a "serious" robotics team. It's all about where your priorities are.

It's less a matter of making FRC obsolete, and more a matter of creating mature STEM-based learning initiatives that can make informed decisions based on their community's needs.

[Citrus Dad]

In a word, yes. My hunch is that FIRST would like to become obsolete the same way the Susan G. Komen Foundation would like to become obsolete.

Honestly, if Marshall and his team feels their students are ready for a bigger challenge that FRC, they should be commended. Especially if it leaves them more interested in STEM fields and more prepared for college and a career.

I don't think that's true. SGK is trying to eliminate breast cancer. Younger students who wouldn't consider a STEM career will always need to be inspired. And working solely in your community is not the same as changing the culture.

And it's an odd way to push teams out of FRC--take away the competitive incentive by splitting the championship. That seem very passive aggressive. I would expect a more thoughtful way of encouraging "up and out."

[efoote868]

FIRST HQ appears to be pretty much ignoring any proposals from the FRC community up to this point other than "we might bring together the championsplit winners at a later date..."

I would be very surprised if they were to respond directly to any idea on Chief Delphi, let alone every single post. Best thing they can do now is keep discussions internal, then release a complete and polished presentation of what is happening in the future. Simple reason is that rampant speculation would make the situation worse than it already is.

[dodar]

I would be very surprised if they were to respond directly to any idea on Chief Delphi, let alone every single post. Best thing they can do now is keep discussions internal, then release a complete and polished presentation of what is happening in the future. Simple reason is that rampant speculation would make the situation worse than it already is.

Is not rampant speculation what we already have?

[EricH]

Is not rampant speculation what we already have?

I think that's a fair statement. To a point, at any rate. I think we also have a lot of discussion on alternatives (assuming, mind you, that certain features of the split identified by FIRST will be changed) and a fair amount of discussion of potential impact.



That being said, I think the latter two parts can also fall into rampant speculation. Partly because we don't know for sure about the impact...