[FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Originally posted: http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...idays-06072013

I'm glad he answered our questions and finally gave us an official view on districts from FIRST, in contrast to all the guesses and rumors and misleading presentations (as he mentioned). Bothers me he didn't address international teams fitting into the model though, which was what the question I sent was about...

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Glad to hear that the plan is to eventually have inter-district play. I've heard many conflicting reports on whether this will ever happen over the years. Hope it can happen soon, as the 2014 district expansion is going to start to put some regions in a difficult spot (NY, for example.)

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I think this mostly falls under "There may be some geographic areas in which the standard District model does not make sense. If we find this is the case, FRC will still continue to be supported in these areas, of course." One of the biggest issues with the district model (IMO) is how it's so closed off - you only compete within your geographical region. That issue needs to be solved for international teams and areas that simply don't have the population density to support a district model - we have to find a way to allow these teams to continue attending multiple regionals if they want, instead of cutting off all their options by closing off areas for districts.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

That applies to Israel, since we have a regional, but I son't see how this applies to teams like those in China and Taiwan, that obviously can't compete in districts and would have an enormous financial difficulty in coming to Israel. The solution to this would be leaving some areas in the US with regionals, which was made pretty clear to not be part of the goal, or for them to go to Canada, if they wouldn't have districts (which is a topic that wasn't adressed in the answer).

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Very cool! Those of us who are currently in MAR hope that we can have some inter-district play with New England in coming seasons.

Bar, you're asking for too much too soon. This type of detail doesn't really need to be answered right now. Districts won't just pop up all over in one or even two seasons. When the issue does become more relevant, I'm sure Frank will provide the answers.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

My question was satidfied. That was essentially the answer I was hoping for.

For those keeping track of the timeline:
2009-FiM does Pilot district system that is used by abouty 9% of the FRC population
2010-Fim keeps the format with a handful of tweaks.
2011-Rumors of MAR and meetings
2012-MAR creates their version and an additional 6% of FRC now doing districts (total about 16%)
2013-More rumors...
2014- NE FIRST and PNW joing the district... with probably around 12-16% more of the the FRC population (total for 2014 will likey be about 30-35% of FIRST now have a district system).
2015- Assume 2 -3 more areas join in for another 12-18%, and FRC will be around 50% District system.
2016- Assume another 3 Regions, and FRC will be at about 65-70% District system....

I would actually love to see Isreal create the first Mini-Region. With about 48 teams, you could do 3 24 team events with 4 alliances of 3 elims. Teams would play at 2/3 events and then all would play at the Regional Championship. Very scalable in that format up to 60 teams (3 events of 40 with full 8 alliance elim). Much beyond 60 would get a bit tricky, but realistically that would take a while to hit that number. This would be a giant departure from the current format, but I think it would work really well for isolated area of the world.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

That's a very interesting consept... We've been having discussions about whether districts would work for us for a couple of years now, but I don't think there was a similar suggestion... I wonder what other Israelis would think of this idea.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I think they'd be well off focusing on building teams and events nearby in Europe. I'd bet they could have at least two full size regionals in Europe in two years if that was their goal. 4334 and the city of Calgary showed this year that you can do things like going from having just two teams (one a rookie) west of Ontario in one year to a successful local regional in the next. Growth doesn't have to take a long time.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I'm glad he answered this question, super glad so many wrote about it with me, and super glad the answer is the one I was hoping for.

I wrote that an issue of Districts is that teams would only be ever able to play with teams from their general area and not have the freedom to travel. If ANY district of ANY week can earn you the SAME qualifying points for your Regional Championship, there would be a lot of fun to be had with traveling to different places. And if some Districts all over the world earned teams more or fewer Qualifying points (based on team capacity), then we could see something very similar to the current/past Regional Event model where some events as High Risk / High Reward and Low Risk / Low Reward.

I've now become more exited than ever for NY districts.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Israel went from 12 teams to 30 or 40 in 1-2 years once the regional got started. Most of those teams are still around, and the regional is now attracting some U.S. teams in addition to the "locals".

OTOH, Brazil did something similar at about the same time, I think with a few more teams. That didn't work out for more than a couple of years--there is now no Brazil Regional, and fewer teams. Other than Israel, there are no regionals south of the U.S. border (Hawaii doesn't count as south of the border) at this time.

What happened? I don't know. However, with rapid growth comes the challenge of sustainability. You can't just start 30 teams overnight with a short-term grant and expect them to still be there in 5 years or more after the grant runs out--you want them to diversify their funding to be more sustainable. How does it help you to have 25 teams fail as soon as the seed money runs out?



That said, I'm sure that this hasn't slipped FIRST's mind. However, I'm thinking that they just aren't sure how they're going to deal with it yet, so they aren't saying anything.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

As Frank mentioned there is a committee that is working on coming up with a unified points and advancement system with the long term goal of allowing teams to travel out side of their district. In the mean time teams in the district system are still free to travel to traditional regionals as well as play in their district. It is not going to happen over night but we will get there eventually.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I love the idea of cross-district competition. Along with this idea I would like to see "open" and "closed" competitions. Open being cross-district play and closed being district only play.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

As far as international teams go, I've noticed that there's almost 40 teams in Mexico now, and plenty of rookies the last couple years. Has anyone heard anything about a Mexican regional?

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I've heard rumors over the last couple of years. Still hasn't happened.

I've also heard rumors about one down in Australia/NZ at various times. NZ fell through, at least at the FRC level, back when I was a student. Australia, I'm not sure where they're at in terms of official FRC competitions.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I think the reason the Israeli regional survived it's first couple of years is that it was an Israeli initiative instead of a FIRST initiative, and that it recieved a lot of support from many major bodies in Israel, first and foremost the Technion, Israel's leading technological university.

Back in the summer of 2011 (I think), I heard rumors of an Australian regional starting in 2014, but I guess if that was the case we would've known by now...

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

In Brazil we have a lot of challenges to turn The FIRST in a strong program.

- our school season starts at march and ends at december (we spend all summer vacations on the build season) and the schools are closed at summer.

-Money: $5.000 for registration in U.S is realy not the same even $5.000 in Brazil, and the exchange literally changes it everytime (we can get 5.000 dollar today and tomorrow this can have the half of the value).

-Kit Of Parts: All brazilian teams, or pick they KOP at a local kick off in U.S and bring at the plane (ilegal for brazilians law) or need to wait a month for receive by mail with a big Importation brazilian tax (some times you can buy a car only with the tax) , (for us 1772 we don´t use KOP anymore, we pick it at the first event and use in the next year)

for this and much more the first 2 events in Brazil had problems.


by the same way, we (1772), 383, 1156, 1382 and 1860 still strong in FRC, now we need to use this "know how" for solve this problems and expand for more teams.

We probably will have more 1 to 3 teams with us at orlando regional next year, and 1772 and 383 are working STRONGLY together for have a regional in Brazil next year or 2015

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

The deep south is one of those regions that is not ready for districts. Just saying, it will take a long time before there are enough teams in the area to support it. We've wondered if we could compete in the Texas districts, but its quite a drive from where many of us are.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

On the division slide that Frank references it groups LA with OK, MS, and AR. That would be interesting. It's not that much bigger of a distance between the furthest teams than what we can expect when Texas goes to the district system. It's also 106 teams and 3 regionals now.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I would think that one of the next district regions to be set up will be Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa that would. Although im not sure how many teams FIRST is envisioning each district to have.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Oh, I personally doubt it the MN area will be going any time soon... we may have the team density, but there are a lot more factors than that!

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

One of the things I'm interested to see is how the transition will happen. My biggest concern is how they will deal with teams in areas where districts don't make sense, in the interim before they have a standardized model with cross-travel and a way to incorporate teams that don't fit into district regions. For example, PNW and NE are going to districts for 2014, and the Ontario region is likely to change to districts at some point as well. Depending on how the district borders are defined, this could leave teams in Montreal, BC, Alberta and other parts of Canada with at most one "local" event. As more regions move to districts, more pockets will appear where teams exist, but aren't populous enough for their own region, but don't fit well into neighboring regions.

I'm sure some of the people that emailed Frank asked about this, and I'm sure FIRST has a plan for how to accommodate, but I'm curious to see what that plan is. I'm guessing a lot more of these details will emerge after the 2014 season, which they have had time to evaluate the PNW and NE district pilots and make some decisions on a standardized district model.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

What are some of the other factors at play? Based on the Where in the World is FIRST map, it looks like there are teams clustered around the Twin Cities and then scattered fairly evenly though the rest of the state. Is that one of the problems? Unless there's something pretty major that I'm missing it seems like you would benefit from adopting districts.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I think the plan is to make sure those teams have a regional that is accessible to them as a local event. I say this because in New England, we have several teams that have almost always come to New England regionals from the Albany, NY area. From discussion in another thread, I heard that these teams were not invited to join the district, but that an Albany regional has been confirmed for 2014.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

IIRC one of the major factors for no MN districts that I've seen mentioned on CD is the issue of volunteers/volunteer burnout.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Volunteers, Key Volunteers and event planners. With 180 teams we would need 10 events minimum, that means pretty much 2 events every week plus a championship. We need more people running these events.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

In Jim Zondag's FiM FAQ White Paper he said that in FiM teams are required to supply two volunteers to each tournament that they attend. Assuming district events have around 40 teams in attendance, that's an additional 80 volunteers per event. That still doesn't necessarily fill the Key Volunteer and event planner positions, but FiM, MAR, PNW and NEF must have run into that issue as well and overcome it.

I guess what I'm really trying to say is that, as a member of a Wisconsin team, I really want to see more cool semi-local action.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

People forget that the growth in Minnesota is a result of having a series of programs available for schools and organizations to start teams and keep them relatively sustainable, but the teams themselves across the entire state are rather inexperienced in comparison to the entirety of FRC, much less the two areas that currently support a district. The teams and the representatives that came together to support the districts in Michigan and NJ/PA/DE represent some of the "old guard" of FIRST as a whole.

Minnesota reached 180 teams 7 years after the foundation of their first team. Michigan reached 180 teams 16 years after the foundation of their first team.

It isn't as easy as this community thinks, myself occasionally included, to pick a series of boundaries with a certain number of teams within it and at a certain team density, and declare as armchair directors "You there! Build a district system!" The entire Minnesota program has existed exclusively in the modern 3v3 era. Imagine that! The state also exists almost entirely as an FRC island: there isn't the massive interstate cooperation and competition that exists on pockets of both coasts of the states or between the provinces of Canada.

Minnesota is a relatively dense location and is representative of the success teams can generate to support more teams, but a lot of teams in the state, in addition to the organization as a whole is like bread that hasn't fully risen yet. The ingredients are already in place and the environment is right, but it takes time and care.

I find it surprising the PNW area is jumping on so quickly because of the regions relative novelty as a fully developed area of competition. That will be an area to watch not only for its oft-unnoticed teams, but for their bold push to the new competitive structure.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I want to see increased local action as well, just we have a ways to go yet before we get there. I think by 2017 we will be in a better position to go to districts but that requires a lot of dedication from teams. Soon Minnesota will have a plethora of FIRST alumni graduating from college, I just hope we can find some way to keep them involved and keep them in MN.

You have it exactly right - I first learned about FIRST in its second year of existence in Minnesota. I am going to be graduating from college next year in which case I plan to increase my role with FIRST in Minnesota. There are other people exactly like me throughout the state that want to do more for FIRST but haven't graduated yet or are simply too busy with school.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Having talked with volunteers, Key Volunteers, and Volunteer Coordinators from district areas, it isn't as easy as that. When a team is required to supply volunteers, you never know what you're going to get. Further, those required volunteers aren't really dedicated to the event - as a result, you end up with people signing up then dropping out, and a lot more work for the Volunteer Coordinator. Then you also get people who just don't show up to the event... how do you deal with that? What about small teams with a few kids and 1 mentor? How do you require them to supply volunteers?

The simple fact is that MN has 4 events, and just slightly more volunteers than we need to run 2 of them. Fortunately, almost everyone who lives in the Cities, and thus volunteers for their "home" regional in Minneapolis, also drives up to Duluth - you end up seeing all the same people at both double regionals (In all fairness, there are some volunteers from the Duluth area... but I doubt it's enough to put on even a single regional). That model simply won't work for Districts. We'll have 5 in the Cities, and everyone will volunteer there... all of the out-state events in places like Rochester, Fargo, Duluth, St. Cloud, and wherever else they end up would be horrible to try to run.

Add to that difficulties with Key Volunteers... we have 4 events in the state, but only 2 LRI's, for example. On top of that, we have a single Volunteer Coordinator that handles all 4 events. I wouldn't want to put the pressure of managing 10 events all on her shoulders!

These are all problems that will take time (years) to fix, as we need our local FRC teams and population to mature.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Much of that describes us in the PNW, except that the OR event had it's own volunteer coordinator and the 3 in WA were handled by the same person. Yet we are pushing forward in hopes of making the district model work this year after working to that goal since last season when FIRST wanted us to go to the district model.

So my suggestion is to start scouting places for district events and double down on your volunteer recruitment and get key volunteer people trained this year by shadowing the existing people in those positions this season. FIRST has made it clear that the way forward is the district model better to get ahead of the curve than getting the word that all of the US will be using the district system and be left scrambling.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

It would be extremely helpful if you were able to document your process for accomplishing this!

I would really like to the see the Minnesota FIRST website adopt more of a firstwa.org look. We do not have to worry about FLL, as that is run by High Tech Kids in MN and FTC is a little complicated at the moment but I really like the volunteer signups you guys have as well as the alumni portal you have.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

If you (or anyone!) has any specific suggestions for changes, improvements, or new features for the http://mnfirst.org/ website, please let me know! I just recently took over managing the site (last week, actually), and am open to suggestions!

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Im surprised by the little to no talk of a Canada becoming a district (wouls likely be Ontario and Quebec). I have been told that we can expect a district in 2015, likely not earlier. I'm not sure how much closer or competitive we would become as we are already extremely competitive, and are already close (bonding and social wise).

I will be very happy to see cross districts, as we are 20 minutes away from the Detroit District but arent able to go there. The closest event for us (currently) is 3 hours away (waterloo and buckeye). If we were to get a regional or district here in Windsor I think it would be REALLY cool to see half the team Americans, coming here from mostly Ohio and Michigan.

I really like the idea soneone posted of having sone districts be closed for only that district and sone open for any district teams. That would probably make the open districts more diverse and have an even ratio of dostrict to non-district teams.

Sorry for amy bad spelling I'm on my ipod right now.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

It's tough because 20 has been competing in New England for 22 years- occasionally competing with NY teams (Finger Lakes '08, etc.), but now we can't.
Yes- there's going to be an Albany-area regional, but we won't be competing with most of our good friends from NE anymore, and we have to travel (actually even further than any NE regional we went to) to the Finger Lakes or somewhere else for our second competition.

Inter-district play can't come soon enough. I think it'll be interesting to see what happens when NY goes to districts (i.e. a bunch of districts on Long Island, one in Albany, and one or two in Rochester?)

What doesn't work well for NY is that teams aren't evenly spread across the state, they're tucked into little pockets. There are a TON of teams in the city and on Long Island, a large number near Rochester, and 10 or so in the capital regional near Albany. The rest of the state is sparsely populated with FIRST teams, those teams usually being near a college (i.e 229/4124, 639, etc.)
This spread of teams doesn't lend itself well toward district events.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I actually think having some districts in the CNY areas will greatly help FIRST in NY. There are toooonnnns of school just waiting for FIRST teams, but don't have the support that Rochester/NYC/Albany have.

I'm guessing: 2 in Rochester, 1 in Buffalo, 2 in/around Albany, 2 in/around NYC, 1 in Ithica, 2 in/around up north and the champs at the Carrier Dome at Syracuse University. (wishful thinking at least.)

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Syracuse IS nicely situated between Albany and Rochester. ANd for most of the state, it's rather centrally located. However, it's a hike for NYC teams. I also know that many NYC teams don't have much funding, and going to three events (2 districts and the state champs) might be a lot for them.
The same can be said as an argument FOR districts, though- reducing the cost of doing events.
As it is, Long Island has a regional, and so does NYC. Replacing 2 regionals with 2 districts doesn't really work. I'd expect 4 or 5 districts there, 1/2 in/around Albany, 2 in Rochester, then one or two elsewhere in the state (Ithaca/Oneonta maybe?)


I don't know what's best for New York FIRST, but the way it is right now doesn't seem conducive to district play. The population center of NY First is still in the city, but having teams from Rochester travel to the city for the state championship wouldn't make sense. Traveling from the city up to Syracuse wouldn't make too much sense either. I suspect (and dread) that NY will be left out of districts for a number of years, and when they finally do come, either NY will have a greater FRC population density, or we'll be split into two districts- Upstate NY and Downstate NY. Downstate would include the city, long island, and the surrounding areas, and upstate would include the rest of the state.

Anyway, that's just my opinion.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

4.5 hours isn't that bad of a hike but I know what you mean. However you cant please all the people all the time. Considering that Rochester folks travel a lot out of state (cleveland, boston, DC) I would think they are more willing to make a trek to NYC or Albany for a Champs than a NYC team would be willing to make a trek to Syracuse. Then again, I assure you we can fit Pits and seating for 70-80 teams at the Dome - all comfortably, and I'm not sure where in Albany you could find a venue (though admittedly I haven't looked) I'm sure it would be sweet to put the Champs in NYC, cause it is NYC after all, and having the Champs at, say, Madison Square Garden would be the biggest FIRST venue location since EPCOT (plus it could be televised on MSG). However I'm going to assume that College Basketball will boot us out of MSG, haha.


I wouldn't think splitting up NY would happen, even if it was a possibility. Unlike other states like California or Texas, New York is relatively speaking a short drive, and I think having The Empire State Regional sounds a lot more powerful than The Upstate New York Regional/New York City Regional.

If we were splitting up, and this is again wishful thinking that the logistics were simple, that there was a Niagara Region, with the Western/Central NY teams sharing some Districts with lower Ontario Canada teams. And the Eastern/Northren/City NY teams would side with the New England Region.

But having all of that back and fourth across the boarder would be a pain for teams.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I think college basketball is over by week 7, but it still won't happen because the Knicks or Rangers could be in the playoffs.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Albany has the Times Union Center (where the Rangers play), but as I just said, the Rangers play there.

NYC would be cool because it's NYC, but it's a HIKE for Rochester teams, and it wouldn't help encourage FIRST up near the Canadian border very much.

Syracuse would be decent, because it is centrally located in New York.
I don't know.

Speaking of which- you guys should come to next year's Albany Regional! :D

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Um, are you talking about the NHL New York Rangers? They play at Madison Square Garden.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Hm. I'm not really a "hockey guy".:p

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

It's been added to my list for next mentor meeting.

What would really be cool, is if we had a regional in Syracuse. Then you could take the "Thruway Trifecta" of Finger Lakes, Syracuse and Albany Regional events, one week after the other.

EDIT: I mean, I'm not just saying have our future NY champs in Syracuse cause it's an actual <20 minute drive from 174's school to the Dome, but because it is the largest venue for FIRST (outside NYC venues) that could boast such an event. It's either there, or at NYC somewhere. I don't think teams are going to not go to a Champs in NYC - its NYC for goodness sake - and giving teams all the time to explore the city and its attractions makes the trip for anyone. It is something to think about for the eventual NY Region committee.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I understood what you meant. And if there was a greater FRC team population near 'cuse, you'd probably get a regional there.
That would be more convenient for us than going to Finger Lakes- that's for sure!

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

The Times Union Center would probably be the only venue considered for a NY championship in Albany. What Kevin means is that the Albany Devils (AHL affiliate of the New Jersey Devils) play there. However, GSR has been in the Manchester Monarchs' home arena for years, so there is a precedent for working that out.

My guess is that the Carrier Dome in Syracuse, Times Union Center in Albany,and any number of venues in New York City would be the most likely places to consider.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I can't wait to be one of those old kids who can say "Yeah, I remember the days before districts." and then watch the kid's eyes widen when I explain the days of regionals..

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Its fun, I love telling students about the time before bumpers and the large spinning lights to determine alliance color.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Those are the best, especially since we've kept one of ours in a dusty corner of our shop.

I do wish I was around to tell stories of odd-shaped fields, but I've only been around for the uniform rectangle field. So I get to listen to stories too.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I myself am still a little confused at the district system having never attended one or really read a thorough explanation/description.

Ontario (where I'm from) has some of the most intense competition in all of FIRST with powerhouses like 188, 610, 1114, 1241, 1503, and 2056. Introduction of the district system in Ontario has been a hot topic since 2012.

Currently, there are three regionals in Ontario (GTR-East, Waterloo, GTR-West), with a fourth planning on being introduced for 2014. From the rumours, a district system is in the works for introduction in 2015, with three or four additional districts added on top of the existing four regionals that would have been converted.

From what I've heard, Western Canadian (Calgary, AB) and Festival de Robotique de Montreal (Montreal, QC) would remain regionals.

As I won't be a student member any longer in 2015, it doesn't really affect me. But, the prospect is interesting.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Sorry I didn't get a chance to reply earlier. Yes things will be documented and shared, the goal is to create a blueprint of sorts on how to do the district model.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

A general rule of thumb for districts is that you need enough district events to provide 2 events for every team. So using NE as an example, there are roughly 150 teams. That means we need 300 "spots". Every district event is supposed to have 30-40 teams, so we need between 7.5-10 events. Some teams will want to play 3 events, so NE made it an even 9 events.

If Ontario & Quebec were combined into a district, it looks like there are somewhere around 109 teams (lets say 110). For 110 teams, you need 220 spots, or 5.5-7.3 events. So my guess would be with your current teams, you would need 6 or 7 district events, plus a Championship.

In general the district events are intended to be "smaller" and a little more "low key" - think more of the well run offseason style. And another big intent is to save money, so for example, New England is trying to make sure that all of their sites are free or in-kind donation, so places like expensive convention centers that were used in the past will generally not be used at the district event level, and instead we will go to colleges or very large high schools (which still have some very nice venues, but just much less cost). So if some of your current venues are cheap or free, then the district may stick with them, if they are expensive, chances are they will move to another venue (perhaps in the same area, but more of a college/high school).

Also, most events will be Fri/Sat or Sat/Sun, reducing the amount of time that mentors & students have to take off from work/school. There are still occasional Thurs/Fri events, but it seems like the preference is Fri/Sat where possible.

On the team side of things, teams get at least 20-24 matches for the same registration fee they pay for one regional now, where they usually only get 9 or 10 matches.

Currently progression to the District Championships is based on a points model set by the region. If FIRST standardizes this as Frank mentions, it will allow much easier cross-district play (but the regions still have to have/allocate enough slots & events for "extra" teams).

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Any idea where these nine events would be held? Right now the only ones I can think of are the cities where we had regionals already. (Manchester, Boston, Worcester, Hartford, Lewiston)

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

There will be an event in Rhode Island, somewhere not too far off of Route 95.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I'm sure Maine will keep one with at least one in NH with another in NH/Northern Mass. Based on what I have heard districts need to be located so it is viable to get teams to their two events. Teams in Northern NH, Western NH, Vermont, and Maine will have a lot of travel to do unless careful consideration is taken for where districts are placed. I could get quite expensive if your team has to travel 2-4 hours for both district events and the district championship and potentially move on to the Championship.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Do you have any idea of where the committee wants the New England Championship to be held? Manchester seems like it has a central location and its also the home of FIRST, but Boston is considered to be the major city of New England and probably has a lower average travel distance for all New England teams (I might be a little biased towards Boston).

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I believe they had narrowed it down to Hartford, Boston, and WPI. I don't yet know if a final decision has been made yet.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

I've thought about this for a while. With new info from this thread, this is what I would think with 9 events: Portland area, Manchester, Nashua, WPI, 2 Boston area, Hartford area, south of Hartford(New Britain? Meriden?) Providence area.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

Last I heard a few weeks ago nothing was even close with the district championship location because most venues can't hold 45 teams. I don't see how WPI would be large enough to host a district event as well as host a district and Battlecry.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

At Beantown Blitz, Kim was going around surveying people about the district championship, and it included ranking those three locations, as well ranking a bunch of other aspects of the event (number of matches, number of teams, only best teams, as many teams as possible, etc).

I think that with WPI's new athletic center they can hold many more teams (BattleCry this year had 54 teams), although I have no idea how scheduling 2-3 events would happen. This year, Boston had 51 teams, and CT had 56, so all three of those would appear to be able to house that size of an event.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

We shall find out. It will be sad to see the Boston Regional go. Its probably one of the best regionals in the country. The Boston Regional Planning Committee has done a fantastic job over the years.

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

The WPI venue would probably have enough room, even if they had to use that recreational area in between the pits and stands. I was only at the regional, not BC, so I can't say how easy it would be to squeeze teams in without being forced to use that area. But I just don't think it has the right kind of atmosphere for a championship. The stands are very intimate, which would make for an awesome district, but I just think that a championship needs to be more grand like it is at the Boston Regional. Maybe it's only in my head, but I just don't see the WPI venue putting out the type of spectacular event that an outsider would expect from the New England Robotics Championships. Boston may avoid that problem, but then I think the problem of not enough room for pits may be a factor. Also, the Boston venue would attract a lot more attention from the general public. I can't say anything about Hartford.


I agree. The planning committee was great, and so were the judges (I am biased again, they wrote my team an entire song :D). I loved the venue, and it managed to attract so many distant teams. In the last 2 years we have had teams from Pennsylvania, Florida, California, Canada, Mexico, Turkey, Brazil and almost Alaska (I am very disappointed that they didn't manage to make it here).

Re: [FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013
 

As someone who was on the BattleCry planning committee, I can tell you that the facility can hold 64 teams.

At the regional, we had 42 teams: we ensured everyone got a 10x10 or greater pit, and we did not use the additional pit space in the loading dock area.

At BattleCry, we had 54 teams, using a modified pit layout and the loading dock pits, while ensuring teams had a good amount of room to work in. We could have gone to 66 (22 elimination alliances of 3), but wanted to test things out with a smaller number, both for us and for the teams. We don't like making our teams guinea pigs, so we are trying to ease the event up in size.

So let it be said by someone involved with events at WPI that the facility was designed to hold 64 teams, and can hold 64 teams.