Proof that districts work: PNW
 

The PNW has never been a superpower at worlds. We have sent teams into eliminations at worlds, but getting far has not happened much. Before this year, only 2 teams have ever made it to a division finals from the PNW, and neither one of them made it to Einstein.

This year, we sent 10 teams, out of the 24 we sent, into eliminations. Over on Archimedes, we had an all PNW alliance at #2, which was 2907, 3393, 2557 and 4911. Also, 4077 was the #6 alliance captain. The #6 alliance lost in the quarters, but the #2 made it to semi's

Over on newton, 1983 was picked in the 3rd round by the #6 alliance, and they made it all the way to finals.

On Curie, 2928 was the #3 alliance captain, going undefeated. They made it to the semi's as well.

Then over on Galileo, we had both 4488 and 1318 on the #2 alliance as the 1st and 2nd picks. We made it to the finals as well. 488 was 3rd pick by the #4 alliance, and made it to the semi's.

So this year, we put 10 teams in elims. 9 made it out of quarters, and 3 made it out of semi's. We went from only have 2 teams ever make it to division finals, to having 5. I directly attribute this to the great quality of robots that we sent because of districts, and I think that within the next year or 2 we will finally cross the hump, and send a PNW team to Einstein.

We had such an amazing time at worlds this year, and the entire region plans on coming back with firepower next year.

Go Pacific Northwest!!!

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Teams from Districts made up 27% of the teams at Championships but 42% of the teams in eliminations and 38% of teams on Einstein (6 of 16).

Unsurprisingly FiM had an outsized impact with over 75% of the Michigan teams competing in Elims, but each Districts outperformed the non-District teams on average.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Small correction, 488 only made it to the quarters in Galileo.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Yep, we caught on to that 2 years ago in MAR, after watching Michigan win it all for a while...

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

2009 Einstein never forget :rolleyes:

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

This year, the PNW made up 6% of teams at the Championship and we managed to bring in ~6.5% of Division Awards:

Division Finalists: 4488, 1983 and 1318.
Gracious Professionalism: 4077
Innovation in Control: 1540

The PNW also managed to have an above average seed placement, with an average Rank of ~41/100 per division.

I know the PNW has never hit Einstein, but I'd have to do some more digging, because I think we might be missing something.

Off the top of my head I know 1983 went to Division Quarters and Semis twice each with a Finals run this year. I thought that 1318 might have gone to the finals in 2009, or that Mean Machine might have gone to the finals in 2012 with 1717/469. Both went out in Semis though. I know 488 went to the Finals on Archimedes in 2009, because I remember watching it. Looking it up I saw 1510 also went to the Finals in 2005 on Curie. Are those the Finalists you are referring too? I think we might be missing one...

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Could someone do a comparison removing teams that qualified to champs only based on being the 3rd alliance pick?

This is a really bad conclusion to say that districts made the area, PNW, MAR, FIM, NE better. They forced these regions to send better teams to champs because of the points systems.
I believe if you do compare apples to apple you will see much closer numbers. Yes more matches help teams.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

The IRS alliance (1318,973,25) was knocked out in the semis on Galileo that year.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Yep, it was a shame too. What a great robot...


*Edit: Paul, I'd love to hear about your experience this season. Not getting to attend any events with 1899 was strange, and one of the downsides of districts. You put out another beautiful looking machine and I'd love to hear how 2014 was and what you have in store for 2015. Hope to see you next year!*

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I'll put up some MAR stats while we're talking about districts

There was a MAR team on the finals of each division this year (including Einstein)

Since 2012 and the foundation of MAR, we've had 4 unique teams on Einstein (25, 303, 1640 x 2, 2590).

25 won Einstein in 2012.

2014 Champs:

MAR represented 5.75% of all teams at Champs, at 23 teams.

MAR made up 7.03% of elimination teams, at 9 teams selected to play on an elims alliance (11, 25, 193, 225, 341, 1218, 1640, 2590)

2590 was the only alliance captain.
341 was taken in the first round
11, 25, 225, 1640 were taken in the second round
193, 1218, 2016 were taken in the third round. 193 and 2016 did not play any elims matches.

Awards:

Archimedes Winner - 2590
Newton Winner - 1640
Newton Finalist - 341
Galileo Finalist - 1218
Curie Finalist - 2016
Einstein Finalist - 1640
Archimedes Entrepreneurship - 2590
Newton Creativity - 25

Total - 8

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Praying that Texas moves to a district system this year. We've got some serious competition already, and moving to a district model like this would only make it better and would send all of the right teams. Really looking forward to this...

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

As Link07 did for MAR, I'll do for FiM

Since 2009 and the foundation of FiM, we've had 10 unique teams on Einstein (33, 51, 67 x3, 68, 74, 217 x2 , 247, 469 x3, 548, 862).

67 winning in 09, 10. 469 and 74 winning in 14.

2014 Champs:

FiM represented 8.5% of all teams at Champs, at 34 teams.

FiM made up 20.3% of elimination teams, at 26 teams selected to play.

27, 51, 67, 503, 862, 910, 1718, 2054 and 2137 were alliance captains.
33, 70, 314, 469, 1023, 2337, 3539 were taken in the first round
494, 573, 1918, 2959 were taken in the second round
68, 74, 217, 548, 2834, 3098 were taken in the third round. 217 did not play any elims matches.

Awards:

Curie Winner - 74, 469
Galileo Winner - 67
Archimedes Finalist - 27, 33
Curie Finalist - 573, 1718

Einstein Winner - 74, 469
Galileo Highest Rookie Seed/Rookie All Star - 4967
Galileo Team Spirit - 1023

Chairman's Award - 27

Total - 13

I'm a fan of districts, and a fan of the PNW district in particular. I'll agree that there is a correlation between PNW teams having an improvement in results at worlds and the introduction of a district structure this year.



But I'd also suggest that the PNW has grown up a lot in the past five years. We used to have a few teams out here that could compete on a world stage, but back east there would be dozens of teams that good, and they would push each other to excellence.



It has been a real pleasure to watch the PNW grow, first in team numbers and then in experience, over the past several years. To be fair, PNW isn't quite as competitive yet as Ontario, Michigan and the other big regions, but it is a lot closer than it used to be. Districts help, but the simple reason PNW did better this year is because the PNW is the best it has ever been... and it keeps getting better.



Districts make a difference, but lets also credit the students, mentors, volunteers, sponsors, and especially the PNW leadership team who have made this kind of advancement possible.



Jason

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I don't think any of the arguments against districts stated that districts would make teams in that area less competitive.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I don't necessarily think Districts make teams better. At least, it's not the cause, it's the effect. Areas that require districts already have a lot of teams, which are then going to have more really good teams that can make it to elims. Really districts basically says "hey, we have a lot of teams here." It doesn't mean that the teams are better - although they are by sheer virtue of having more teams means that there will be more world-class contenders. Also, FiM has a lot of teams that didn't move on to Worlds that still made it to MSC and are better than a lot of the teams that were at St Louis. I think that these mid-level Michigan teams could compete at worlds, but the limit that Michigan could send held them back.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I disagree. Districts definitely make a large majority of teams better and we saw it in the PNW this year:

-More matches: Practice paid off and Increase in Strategic play at team's second events and the District Championship
-Unbag Time: Even several rookie teams made significant changes between events and saw great success later on, because of this. *Huge shout-out to 4980*. Iteration is a huge part of engineering

The list can go on and on. Just getting teams out to more events means more opportunities to get awards and opportunities to perform well. This can be a great source of motivation and inspiration for some.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Could you imagine Texas teams in 2-3 years if we went districts!!! We have 2 world champs in the last two years. Im scared to think on how good texas would become.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I knew Districts worked when FiM did their first championships back in 2009 and HOT was going to the championships with 85 matches under their belt to my teams dozen. I can't wait til New York goes District!

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Correction: 4967 won Highest Rookie Seed and Rookie Inspiration
4917 won Rookie All Star

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

One of the biggest reasons that I think that districts make teams better is increased exposure to a variety of teams.

If you play in one event, you get a certain idea of what is required to be successful so you make some improvements to try to achieve the benchmark you saw. Then in your next event you see some teams that blew away anything you saw in your first event. Time to reset the benchmark.

Then you make it to the regional championship (I hate when it's called the district championship) and you realize how high the bar really is. Now you really have to figure out how to raise you game.

By the time you make it to World Championships, you've already seen the game at such a high level that you're ready for anything. The fact that the district system forces a higher level of competition results in the teams being much more prepared for what they'll see in St. Louis.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I have to somewhat disagree. There were still a good number of teams unable to manipulate the ball at MAR champs and was certainly not at the championship level.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

The Team 358 all awards spreadsheet can solve this quickly.
Here is a sort of all Einstein apperances prior to this season, I haven't updated it yet with 2014 results.

Team # of Division Titles
177 7
217 6
67 5
233 5
25 5
71 4
111 4
254 4
469 4
33 3
60 3
175 3
968 3
987 3
1114 3
16 2
64 2
118 2
144 2
148 2
173 2
294 2
330 2
340 2
494 2
503 2
1126 2
1218 2
2056 2
51 1
53 1
56 1
59 1
65 1
66 1
68 1
75 1
85 1
108 1
115 1
121 1
122 1
125 1
179 1
180 1
190 1
195 1
201 1
207 1
222 1
236 1
245 1
247 1
279 1
292 1
296 1
302 1
303 1
341 1
343 1
348 1
349 1
378 1
435 1
451 1
522 1
548 1
610 1
766 1
781 1
862 1
868 1
910 1
971 1
973 1
1024 1
1038 1
1124 1
1139 1
1241 1
1270 1
1319 1
1388 1
1477 1
1503 1
1507 1
1519 1
1625 1
1640 1
1678 1
1902 1
2016 1
2041 1
2194 1
2753 1
3138 1
3357 1
3476 1
4334 1

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

^That.

I think the rather obvious conclusion that more matches--with the ability to improve between/during each event--makes for more competitive robots is, well, rather obvious.

Districts allow teams more matches and more time to work on their robots. If that *doesn't* improve teams, then teams are doing something wrong!

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I don't think I did a good job of making my point, so I'll try again.

(Aging myself here a bit...)

Back when "The Dream Team" dominated the Olympics way back when, there was debate about if a team dominating the Olympics was good for basketball. After all of the debate, the consensus was that having the Dream Team would cause the rest of the world to raise their level of play because now they knew what basketball at the highest level was like. In the end, that prediction came true because the USA has since been challenged and beaten - the rest of the world rose to the challenge.

I think the same effect happens to teams that compete in FIRST. The better the teams they compete against, the better they themselves will be. I know that we learned a lot from MSC that made us a way better team then we would've been without it.

There will always be teams that are happy with where they are. However, there are also a lot of teams that want to be very competitive and want to be the best. If your target of what is "the best" is higher than others targets, then I believe your higher target will naturally make you better.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Here's a thread I created in 2009 to talk about FiM's success that year on Einstein. It should provide some interesting perspective based on the past few years. With more years and other regions, we have plenty more data since then. Additionally, you'll notice that the two factors I broke out specifically at the end have since been adopted outside of the district model.
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=77045

Not sure if I agree with your assessment. There were certainly teams that didn't have effective ground loading methods, but almost every team at MAR championship could register a possession from the human player. That's a large part of what led to the creation of the "double exchange" strategy (firing a ball immediately back to the human player after getting a possession), which in turn was very popular this past weekend (including 2590's alliance using it to reach Einstein).

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I don't think a lot of people remember how averse a majority of the community was to districts until they actually played out so magnificently in Michigan. There was a lot of talk about it "not really being FIRST" and the like. Look at how far we have come!

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Sorry, this is what I meant. My point was that the level of competition was generally lower than at Champs and MSC.

That strategy was a smart way to deal with the limitations of a lot of robots, but the lack of intake especially gave these robots little strategic depth beyond that, unlike the alliances at champs that used this strategy.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

The best part about the district model from my perspective, was that we were able to bring upgrade packages throughout the season. Increasing our competitiveness as the season progressed. This was likely helpful to many other teams, which overall increased the competitive nature of the PNW this year.

My biggest problem with districts, is how much school I've missed over the last month. Between 1 day for OSU, 2 for DCMP, and 3 for CMP, it's too much. Especially in the middle of AP study season.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

From my understanding officials where approached in Texas about joining the district model and they were uninterested about that idea because they are able to stay financially feasible with the regional model and are able to produce very good teams from it. That said I would love to see Texas join the district model and match FIM for a total power house district that would significantly boost the excitement of elimination matches at championships.

PNW and NE FIRST both sent a lot of teams to eliminations this year because of the district model and I can't wait to see even more areas adopt it and make the competition at championships that much more intense and fun to watch.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

To be fair you only missed one more day of school vs attending a single regional and winning your way to CMP at that event. Note when selecting the schedule for the PNW district events we specifically offered to have Sat-Sun events and none of the venues wanted that schedule, they all wanted to do Fri-Sat events.

The reality was that in the PNW the cost of the first year of the district system was not that much higher than running the Regionals of the past, particularly the 2011 and 2012 seasons. That included purchasing fields, fleshing out our AV equipment to have enough for 2 fields, Pipe and drape, floor protection, pit power distribution system, and the materials to build the road cases to transport all of those items. Now that the initial significant capital expenditures have been made the cost in future years will be significantly less than running multiple regionals.

With the change to the district system some of the initial registration, and all of the 3rd event fees go back to the district, so overall in the long run it becomes much more financially viable and sustainable than multiple regional events. Though if the district chooses to rent things like pipe and drape, floor coverings and pay an outside vendor for catering and AV production the long term savings may not materialize or be as significant.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I could tell from watching that the standard at any of the District Championship events was significantly higher that either of the regionals I attended. I think There might even be some Michiganders with pretty graphs and data to back that assertion up.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

To me the proof that the district system works has nothing to do with more teams from a district making it to finals and more of those teams advancing farther in those finals, that is just a nice side benefit.

The real proof lies in the students of the teams that didn't make it to CMP or even DCMP.

As the FIRST Senior Mentor for Washington state and a RI or LRI at 5 district events and the DCMP I spent a lot of time talking to team members, both students and coaches about the District system. Every single student I talked to and the vast majority of Coaches and Mentors were very happy about the change.

Students who had been on teams who have traditionally only attended a single Regional and have never had the chance to make it to CMP were particularly happy about going to the District system. They were now able to have what I call the full engineering experience. In the past they got one chance to test their solution to the problem at hand. With two events they were able to take the lessons learned at the event and then iterate and improve their designs.

Students loved the fact that a higher percentage of teams at an event were able to make it to finals and win awards.

Students loved the increased number of matches.

Some students and mentors shared how they were initially concerned that not playing in a big stadium would some how cheapen the experience but instead found the high school gyms more intimate and just as good of an experience and the viewing of the matches generally better.

The majority of the Coaches and Mentors also shared the feelings of the students and many said they saw even greater growth in their students than they had in the past. They also preferred the 6hrs of unbag time at their shop as they found it much more productive than time at a venue. They were able to gather all the parts and tools needed and lay them all out so they were ready to go when the bag was opened. Some teams even set up stations for the different things they planned and moved the bot to the next station for the next modification or repair. Others used some of that time to practice driving and test their changes.

Teams that did make it to DCMP expressed satisfaction and found the greater level of competition inspiring.

Yes teams that did make it to DCMP and CMP did improve their robot, strategy and driving thanks to having 3 or more chances to make changes and many more matches than they had in the past. But again I consider this a nice side benefit and one that will go away as more Districts come on line.

In conclusion if you in one of the areas where the critical mass is high enough to go to districts now or in the near future I suggest you share with your RD and other leaders in your area that you are ready to make the switch. That means that you also need to step up to the task and encourage others to do the same. Shadow volunteers next season, if you don't go to the districts, so you are prepared to take on those roles when you do go to the District system. If you do go next season step up and volunteer. It is a lot of work moving to the district system, particularly in the first season, but the benefits far outweigh the increased work. If more people step up to the task there really won't be an increased work load for the majority of those involved.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Very true. I think the long term effect on teams will be important to watch. Districts are much more expensive for many teams than the regional model, and I see several teams coming out of this season completely broke. It was a good year competitively, but it is too soon to say if that will be a good thing for the PNW in the long run.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I would not say that Districts are much more expensive for many teams. It certainly was more expensive for a number of teams particularly those from rural areas where there was not a District event near them and even more so for those teams that had traditionally only attended a single a Regional and then made it so DCMP. However in the long term there are plans to mitigate those effects.

In WA for those teams at a public school who took the time to apply for the OSPI grant that would have to travel to one or both of their district events they were given an additional travel stipend that was based on whether they were going to have to travel to one or two district events. I know that did not help teams based in OR.

One of the things that was discussed but was not implemented due to the fact that so much was going on was to encourage teams that lived near a District event to host teams that were traveling to the event. In fact I had one of the rookie teams that was attending an event at the next closest school contact me to put him in contact with another rookie team that was going to be traveling to that event to ask if they wanted to stay with their team members. I have not asked how that turned out but it is certainly something that I will follow up on. I plan on encouraging teams local to an event to reach out to those traveling to that event to make similar offers next season.

In the past in the PNW ~35% of the teams attended two Regionals. However the teams that attended DCMP included many teams who have never attended two Regionals. There were significant capital investments made to start up the district model that will not be needed in future seasons. So if we are able to continue to raise funds at past levels there should be some money to help those teams in need that make it to DCMP and possibly CMP too. However there was not a single team that earned an invite to DCMP that turned it down and only one team that earned an invite to CMP that turned it down and yes funding was a part of the problem of why they couldn't attend.

However as I said previously the real success stories are not the ~15% of teams that made it to CMP or the ~40% that made it to DCMP, it was the ~65% of teams that have never been able to attend more than one event that now were able to get the full engineering experience.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

The entire West Coast lifted its game this year. This may reflect how FIRST has more room to grow here. California had 3 top division qualifiers (1678, 254, 399), two division alliance captain winners (1678, 254), four teams on Einstein (with 973 and 5136) and the finalist alliance captains. 2485 also was the key midfielder for the highest scoring match.

I haven't tallied the other divisions, but in Newton the other division finalist also was captained by 971 coming from the #6 seed. 846 was on a semifinalist.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

On Curie, four California teams played in elims: 254 (winners), 3476, 294, and 1323 (quarterfinalists on the 8th, 7th, and 4th alliances)

Anyone know this information for New England?

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Here's the compiled information for New England:

2014 Champs:

NE represented 7.25% of all teams at Champs, at 29 teams.

NE made up 7.03% of elimination teams, at 9 teams selected to play.

1153 was the only alliance captain
125, 177, 195, 2067 were taken in the first round
558 was taken in the second round
175, 230, 3467 were taken in the third round. 3467 did not play any elims matches.

Awards:

Galileo Finalist - 1153
Archimedes Finalist - 175
Archimedes Winner - 3467

Archimedes Team Spirit - 1519

Total - 4

Hopefully I didn't miss anything

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

2067 was also taken in the first round

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

I think Districts would help our students regardless of what happens on Einstein.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

As I've said a couple of times based on talking to students, coaches and mentors that is highly likely and is the best reason to go to the district system.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Personally, I liked the districts because the increased number of matches really tested your team's design. A chassis or end effector that may have withstood 10 matches may not be able to stay together after 50 matches, and it really challenges the students to build more robust robots or at the very least make spares of everything.

I also have to say that I was really impressed with the quality of the coverage provided in the PNW districts. Some matches were uploaded to Youtube within hours of being played, which was really great for analyzing our strategies before eliminations.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

As a student, I love the district system. We had the opportunity to tune the little things that usually only get caught in the off season. With 86 matches and well over 100 when you include practice matches we had time to really get to know our machine.

I also have loved the increased opportunities for connections between teams due to the increase in events and the more intimate settings. This season I have gone from being friends with teams that we see a few times every year; to truly knowing people from these other teams. Thru volunteering and just hanging out the PNW has become a much more tight knit community this season.

Lastly the increase in awards is very inspirational. Teams that have never won awards before are now winning awards and gaining fulfillment from all their hard work thus being inspired to improve.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

As a student in the NE District, it is obvious that in only 1 year the robots and play are better than last year. With every single team playing 2+ events. Many playing 3 and 4! (And 125 playing 5 official events). Teams have been constantly improving stradegy, driving, robots, etc.

My team has never focused on improving our robot between events. This year we did in between every event. Districts are alot more competitive since you play the same people and they learn your weaknesses.

I LOVED districts and wished I could see one more year (senior). As a driver, at the end of the day, i felt we had too many matches, which was a great feeling. In addition wth only 40 teams max, your chance of eliminations is increased. Another benefit I didnt expect was that due to smaller events and seeing the same teams over and over, I met many new people.

New England I KNOW has been only strengthened because of the district model. Michigan, you better watch out.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

While this is true, the distribution of the day's was much more destructive to our school's class schedule then it had been in years past. The compressed nature was what got to many members of our team, with a few choosing not to attend DCMP or CMP because of how much school they would be missing in such a short time period. (ie. last year, Qualified for CMP wk 2, attended CMP wk 9) to this year ( OSU wk 6, DCMP wk 7, CMP wk 9)

The time crunch isn't ideal, but again, I really enjoyed the district model

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Thanks for the feedback.

Unfortunately there is not a lot that can be done about the time schedule. However we at Washington FIRST Robotics do understand that there are issues and do have a plan to help things as much as possible while working in the confines of the competition season.

For next season the current plan is to have District events weeks 1-5 and DCMP week 6 with the CMP being week 9. This of course means that some teams will still need to do back to back events if a week 5 event is closest or works best for them. However it does increase the time for planning to attend CMP which is often more problematic due to the need to fly.

Long term we would like to purchase an additional field and all the additional equipment that would allow all the district events to take place weeks 1-4 with DCMP staying week 6. Of course some of that depends on the weeks that venues are available.

Unfortunately teams may still need or want to attend their 2 district events in back to back weeks due to the timing of the different venues and which events fill up first. We have not ruled out Sat-Sun events though all of the venues this season wanted to do Fri-Sat events.

Rest assured that we do wish to minimize the impacts on students and mentors while still allowing teams to take advantage of the benefits that the District system provides.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Both 2550 and 4513 declined an invitation to DCMP. Invitations were then extended to 3237 and 2980. 2980 accepted and was in attendance.

There was no response tracked from 3237 on the District website or publicly otherwise. My guess would be they received the wait-list invitation late and did not respond. Due to this, an invitation was never passed down to 2374, who at the time was next in the point system. We ran one team shorter than originally specified (63/64).

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

Note that competitive high school sports teams have similarly disruptive schedules over their season, particularly among spring sports. Both baseball and track teams typically travel to multi-day events on Friday and Saturday. In a large state like California team travel akin to districts is not uncommon.

Re: Proof that districts work: PNW
 

One other point that we all should make to our school administrators: If the schools would recognize the extremely high value of this project-based STEM program, and how "being excused from classes" does NOT mean that the students' educational experience has been postponed, then this would be a non-issue. It's have to make a case for the educational benefit of high school sports, which is the most comparable situation (see the recent Atlantic Monthly article on this topic.) But that's not the case here. Robotics is even more mission-central than music programs that typically are treated as part of the curriculum. Student's classes should be required to schedule around the competitions, not the other way around.