Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Several weeks ago it was officially announced that FIRST WA and Oregon FIRST will be working together to create a new District system for the 2014 competition season. Tonight at 8pm PDT, there was a webinar about the new district model.


*Note: Everything from the webinar and the notes below are subject to change.

My Webinar Notes:

-Moving to the district system will reduce costs for the teams and reduce the professional overhead.
-It will also increase playing time for the teams and improve the quality of the FIRST experience for all teams.
-FIRST HQ has asked both the PNW and NE FIRST to move to districts for the 2014 year
-The district system has invited, but not mandated that teams in Idaho and Montana join (currently a total of 21 teams).
-USFIRST’s goal is for the entire country to be in a district model by 2017, we’d like to be one of the leaders, along with FiM and MAR.
-The PNW Championship is likely to be a week 7 event (April 9-12, 2014), hosted at the Rose Coliseum (Current home of the Autodesk Oregon Regional).
-World champs: (April 23-26, 2014)
-Washington and Oregon had 156 active teams in 2013 and is projecting growth to 185-200 teams in the 2014 season.
-There is likely to be 10-12 district events (depending on size). The current projection is 10 districts, 2 each week.
-The tentative location breakdown: 5 in the Puget Sound, 1 in Central Washington, 1 in Spokane, 3 in Portland.
-Each event will host 32-40 teams.
-Districts will have similar Friday and Saturday schedules to a regional, but Thursday will be different. Thursday will be from 5pm-10pm. Inspections and 1-2 practice matches will occur.
-Teams will get 6 hours of unbag time during each week they will be competing (similar to FiM and MAR).
-Approximately 120 volunteers will be needed per event, please sign up!
-The District Committee has already visited 7-8 possible schools to be used as venues.
-Cost Breakdown: $5,000 per two District entries ($6,500 for rookies), $4,000 for State Champs, and $1,000 for a third district event (will not count towards ranking points, like FiM)
-State Champs will invite the top 64 teams based on the PNW ranking system, USFIRST will have an idea of the National Standardized Point Model by the end of July. This is likely to take the best from the FiM, MAR, NE FIRST and PNW ranking systems.
-PNW has not disclosed the point system yet, but has noted that awards are likely to be at least as important as they are in FiM and Mar.
-Chairman’s awards will be judged at districts. The district winners will then present again at State Champs, and 3 Chairman Winners will qualify for Worlds.
-PNW is debating a point reset for State Champs, unlike FiM.
-If the venues are smaller, teams may be expected to reduce pit sizes to 8’x8’ (rather than the standard 10’x10’).
-Volunteer, Volunteer, Volunteer!

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

That's a little past my eastern bed time, do you know anything about this so far? I love the concept of the district system but I am curious if there would be enough teams in Washington and Oregon to just use those 2 states?

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Slides and video are to be posted on the FIRSTwa.org website.

http://firstwa.org/FRC/Webinars/DistrictModel.aspx

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Thank you all for posting all this great information. For those of us not in the district system yet, the more information and examples we have the better.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Minor nitpick: The two major arenas in Portland are the Rose Garden, and the Memorial Colesium. They're located adjacent to each other in an area called the Rose Quarter. The Memorial Colesium is the one that all the previous FIRST events have been in.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

some other region will adhere to the district system in 2014 or 2015?

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

If anyone from FIRST Washington reads this MAR came into existence in 2012 season not 2013

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

The plan is for a lot of the largest/densest regions will be supporting the district system by 2015.

I was expecting PacNor to have districts by 2015, but I wouldn't be surprised if they implement it all over the summer while other parts of the continent are hesitant to take the leap until the end of the next competition season.

Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Michigan does a points reallocation system where they weight points in district play at a split of something like 65/35 in favor of their CMP.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

In MAR at least, point values awarded at the Regional Championships are tripled from the normal District Event point values.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Points at MSC are worth 3 times what they are at other FiM events (ie: a win is 6 pts).

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Directly from the supplemental rules on the FiM site, as linked above...


Edit:| Didn't see Littleboy's post. Leaving this one up because it has the percentages in it as well.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

Well this sucks for us. Where we hade 4 regionals within driving distance this year with this new district even a second event is out of the question.

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

the same goes for us, probably in 2017 we can only compete outside the U.S., but until then we will have regionals in Mexico and Brazil, working for it!

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

I have a great deal of faith in the PNW organizers... they have always been gracious, welcoming and inclusive. I don't think a district system will change that.

Jason

Re: Pacific NW District (Official)
 

I have to say it: In the Sound itself? Water Game?!?!?