Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Are there any off season summer events in Oregon or Southern Washngton

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Based on this part of the FIRST website, there are two on the same weekend in October in Oregon. http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr.../calendar/list

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Yeah but it would be sweet if someone started an off season event that occurred during the summer and uses this years robot

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Well, you would still use this year's robot in an October event, right?

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

So... why not you? http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/2076

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Unless that competition does something strange, offseasons in October still play Aerial Assist.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

It is possible that he is referring to BunnyBots. I know that this is a big deal in Oregon.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Yes, the October events we host, Girls' Generation and Rookie Rumble are Aerial Assist and are held October 11th and 12th. We hold them during the school year in order to to get NEW members energized about the season to come. Things are pretty quiet around Oregon competition-wise in the summer.

The rules for BunnyBots, our pre-season FRC-class competition with a different game, will be announced Sept 1st. That competition is Dec 20th.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

I know it doesn't quite fit the bill as a summer offseason but our team really does enjoy BunnyBots and I would recommend trying it. It's a much more relaxed schedule, and it's an opportunity to take risks that you might not want to in the regular competition season. For example, having totally unpracticed drivers? Not a big deal. Don't really feel like scouting? Don't worry about it. The strategies are still evolving at alliance selection. Having somebody new design a critical component? You have enough time for a couple extra revs. And if stuff doesn't work, oh well. You've got the regular season ahead of you.

And if you want more information you should probably message Dale Yocum, who has conveniently already posted in this thread. :D

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Create one for next summer! Not only are offseason competitions amazing for developing pre-rookies, rookies, veteran members, and new drivers, but they also provide a great opportunity for fund raising and teaching training workshops for teams in the area. Offseason competitions are a great resource for developing the level of competition in your district.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Washington FIRST Robotics the non-profit organization tasked with running the PNW FRC district does have two official FRC fields and game specific field elements for Aerial Assist and 1 full set of electronics. They are available to teams in the PNW district to host their own off-season event. If anyone is interested you can PM me and I'll help you sort out the details. We may also consider requests from teams outside of the PNW district. Note because we have a single FMS and electronics it will need to work around the events that have already be scheduled or are already in the planning stages.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

How do training work shops come into play with an off season event .

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

FIRSTfare, our region's big conference for FRC teams, is being held at Gladstone High in the Portland Metro area Oct 27th. That gives new and returning members an overview of a wide range of topics. Beyond that each team has their own method for getting people up to speed. That's also what BunnyBots is for.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Are the presenters in First Fare generally students or mentors?

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

I haven't actually been there myself but I would guess it's generally mentors, given that I know one of our mentors presented there last year and that their speaker signup on their website asks for your profession. Could somebody who has been there confirm?

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

About 60% are mentors the others are leadership students with demonstrated expertise in a particular area. For example the Chairman's award session is generally given by the Chairman's department students from area teams.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Wow. California doesn't even have one field....

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Perks to a district system.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

I don't know if there is significant interest for another off-season event on that scale just for Oregon. The teams that would be competing from Oregon would likely be some of the same teams that compete in 1540's BunnyBot event each year, and BunnyBot provides an excellent opportunity to try new things for teams (ie, 2471's swerve ect). Girls Generation gives a GREAT opportunity to girls on a robotics team to become more involved by demonstrating their skill sets that they may not be able to show otherwise. Rookie Rumble gives Rookies a chance to become more proficient at working in a FIRST environment. My point is that each of these events presents a very clear benefit for the time and money that a team puts into it. Hosting a vanilla off-season event that is between Oregon and (potential) Washington teams, which would have some benefits, doesn't seem very useful to me. I would argue that 1540's events already cover the benefits of hosting an Aerial Assist off-season event by providing a clear framework of rules to help develop teams and their members.

Another important piece of FIRST is Money. Many teams in Oregon lack the funding to attend many of these off-season events. Some even lacked the funding to attend the DCMP after qualifying through districts.

Personally, I'm not convinced we need another off-season event in Oregon because I think the current events hosted by 1540 are great substitutes for the Vanilla FRC game.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Due to the lack of off-season events in PNW many teams are choosing to go out of state for events. I know of at least 4 teams from PNW that are planning on traveling to either Chezy Champs or IRI in search of competition this summer. The fact that these teams are willing to invest $10,000's in traveling across the country makes me think that there is enough money out there for hosting off season events in PNW. In the past it has been expensive to ship fields across the country for a single event which is why Washington and Oregon Girls Generation competitions are back to back weeks, now that FIRSTWA has everything necessary to run events many of the price barriers have either been greatly reduced or eliminated entirely.Girls Gen is great but I feel we are missing out on a large part of the FIRST experience in the rest of the country.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

TL;DR of Spencer's post - We can't grow if we don't try.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Don't get me wrong, I would love an actual off-season event that everyone can take part in and would gladly help plan it. I just want to make sure that teams won't run into the red because they think they need to attend an off-season event. I know this point sounds improbable, but it's happened twice while I've been in the PNW.

If we want to start planning this type of off-season event, perhaps we should first get a gauge of how many PNW teams would be interested in attending. Because without demand, why host the event

Edit: My posts so far were just referring to the bloc of teams that currently attend 1540 off-season events, which would likely need to be expanded to effectively host an off-season event. I was assuming that the teams would come from Oregon, where funding is VERY tight for many teams. I also wasn't including greater Washington because of the travel time from Spokane or Seattle-Tacoma. If Greater Washington teams were interested in making the drive, or Oregon teams to wherever I would have no argument at all.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Most offseason events cost $200 out here. That's literally less than one full day standing outside a grocery store asking for a few bucks and displaying your robot.

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

Add travel, food and other expenses and it isn't just the registration fee. See my above edit

Re: Any Off Season Events in Oregon
 

The trick is to put the offseason in a place where those are as reduced as possible.

-Food is actually one of the ways for an interested team to reduce the cost or make money from the event (AKA fundraise)--have a snack bar at the event and have team members pay for their food. If the prices are reasonable, then people will clean the snack stand out. (Trust me. I've seen that a couple of times.)

-Travel can be reduced by a number of methods. For example, strategic placement near the "day trip" center of as many teams as possible eliminates any chance of hotel expenses for the local teams [HINT for any organizers]. Carpooling with other teams can help; having everybody in a car share the cost of fuel, and I'm sure there are a few other tricks.

-Not sure what "other expenses" you refer to. Repairing the robot comes to mind; often there are spare parts and scrap materials left from the season, so you've already paid for those.

Most offseasons cost between $100 and $300 for registration; I find it hard to imagine one that would cost more than $500/team total including everything (travel, etc.) if within a day-trip range. As pointed out earlier, you can easily raise the funds for that. Going out of the day-trip range, you'd need to account for 1-2 hotel nights, still not too terrible depending on where you stay. (Say around $25/person/night assuming 4 in a room, maybe less, maybe with breakfast included.)