Hey, guys.... let's cool down. No need for a flame war over something like the Chairman's Award. Come on, is that really in the spirit of FIRST?

For the record, I support letting Chairman's Award winners go to Nationals. For FIRST's highest honor, it's only fair. Chairman's Award winners have distinguished themselves not only as competitors, but as a TEAM. That's more important than anything, I think. Let them come as long as they want. They deserve it.

I know the story behind what you are talking about.
I feel you are not accurately depicting the events as they occurred.

I also feel this discussion has moved past all usefulness.
It's turning into a flame war.

FIRST likes the Chairman's Award.
FIRST chooses to let all Chairman's Awards teams attend nationals.
FIRST will not change it's policy. (They REALLLLLLY like Chairman's teams, this is becoming more and more apparent).

Deal with it.


Everyone seems to have weighed in enough opinions...
Brandon?

When I wrote that, I did not mean get rid of Chairman's or not allow them to go to Nationals. Chairmans is a great thing, but this is after all the FIRST Robotics Competition, and not the FIRST Chairmans Competition. Sure it is more than robots, but they should give those who win the robot portion of the competiton a shoe-in for the championships next year.

I vote for allowing them to go, though. FIRST really wants to keep these teams in the competition, to keep these kinds of great shows of community effort to continue.

They do.

http://www.usfirst.org/robotics/res_art9.htm

Thanks Rob.. looks like I skipped over that bullet earlier.

Then disregard all of my posts in this topic. :D

Thats funny.. they didn't open it up to us... :-(

We weren't put on the list even tho we were on the waiting list and called them and everything

same with us


Just for the record : I brought this up to see everyone's opinions. I know it can be very controversial and I myself have very strong opinions. I was just curious to see if anyone could bring to the light something I might have overlooked when I formulated my opinion.

John V. Neun - What events do you think I'm not accurately depicting?

Re: Yea!
 

I totally agree with you! I mean our team won chairman's @ UCF in Orlando...and I know how hard we all worked on it for that...(the format had to be perfect, information in it had to be good and worth reading, the presentation @ the regional!...everything goes into it!) but winning @ the national level...wow! What an honor is all I have to say. I mean I am totally proud of my team and feel like we rock, and we won it @ the regional level...how do you think the grand winners feel? I cant even imagine...Id be feeling...wow, I cant even put into words what I would be feeling...I just know that it would be good and that the winners of the award should be proud and should get the rights to go to nats every year! They totally earned it! :D

I feel you are unfairly portraying the team you are talking about. Every interaction I've EVER had with said team has been highly positive. I feel they are a prime example of what FIRST should be all about.

Think about the phrase "One team, two bots"
Now re-evaluate that phrase to mean "Two teams, 1/2 the budget" and ask yourself what would have happened to your team, without their support.

They ARE one of the best teams in FIRST. They DO deserve to go to the championship. They DO deserve the chairman's award. They DEFINITELY deserved to attend nationals this year, and made a very positive showing in their division (seeded top 20 I believe).

What you are saying about them is just sort of slander. You've come right out on this public forum, and said "I don't think they deserved to attend nationals".
How graciously proffesional of you.

Well seeing as how they are an odd number team, this year didn't matter if they had won the award or not. And I definitely did not have them in mind when I posed this question. I actually had this thought a while back, and I merely used them as an example to prove a much larger point. I don't know what your connection with them is, but I see them almost every night when we work on our robots and this year has been a bit hostile. There are some people who exhibit great qualities on their team and have made a difference for them, but I am sure you have not interacted with all of them, and I can honestly tell you that not all of them have great qualities.
Also it is not they who support us, but their sponsor. They were there for us last year and as always we have supported them. You can talk to anyone on my team and you will get the same response. This year they haven't been very supportive of our team, but we still show them our support and get rejected. Think of how it must feel to try to cheer with them and be unacknowledged.

At the Granite State Regional, they were chosen along with us as a finalist. The first match, our robots were on the field together. I tried getting the cheer of BAE going, but all they would chant was their team number. Now is that support for you? I definitely didn't feel any. Now can you tell me that you know them better?

AJ, I don't want to single you out here but there are others who think along the same lines as your post above and I think some of you are missing the point here...

Anyone who thinks that winning the National Championship is the most important thing in FIRST is seriously mistaken :ahh:

If you have forgotten, FIRST means: For INSPIRATION and RECOGNITION of Science and Technology :rolleyes:

The most important thing a team can do is to INSPIRE as many students, mentors, parents, and community members as they can. This is what the Chairman's award RECOGNIZES, and those are the teams that should always be at Nationals because they are the ones that have proven to inspire others the most... EVEN 8 years after they have won the award ;)

Again, enough said :yikes:

Yep.

but i think the award should be to a team that is not able to go to nats that year

First, to the last post by 18volt,

That would be unfair to everyone else at competition who has already earned their spot via previous accomplishments or team number. They may have worked just as hard, or harder, in their community than another team and don't have a chance to win the only award more important than the National Championships?

--

Now to the thread start:
2003 ~ Still Competes ~ 103 - NASA/Amplifier Research/Custom Finishers/Lutron Electronics/BAE Systems & Palisades High School
2002 ~ Still Competes ~ 175 - UTC/Hamilton Sundstrand Space Systems International/Techni-Products/Veritech Media & Enrico Fermi High School
2001 ~ Still Competes ~ 22 - NASAJPL/Boeing/Rocketdyne/FADL Engineering/Decker Machine & Chatsworth High School
2000 ~ Still Competes ~ 16 - Baxter Healthcare Corporation & Mountain Home High School
1999 ~ Still Competes ~ 120 - NASA Lewis Research Center/TRW, Inc./Battelle Memorial Institute & East Technical High School
1998 ~ Out of FIRST ~ 23 - Boston Edison & Plymouth North High School
1997 ~ Still Competes ~ 47 - Delphi International & Pontiac Central High School
1996 ~ Out of FIRST ~ 144 - Procter & Gamble & Walnut Hills High School
1995 ~ Still Competes ~ 151 - Lockheed Sanders & Nashua High School
1994 ~ Still Competes ~ 191 - Xerox Corporation & JC Wilson Magnet High School
1993 ~ Out of FIRST ~ 7 - AT&T Bell Labs & Science High School
1992 ~ Still Competes ~ 191 - Xerox Corporation & JC Wilson Magnet High School


In the 11 years that FIRST has been around (previous to now), 10 teams have won chairman's (191 won twice). Of that 10, 7 competed this year. 3 of them were qualified for nationals because of winning chairman's award in the past. The other 4 were odd-numbered and already qualified because of it.

So roughly 50% of the chairman's award winners qualify because of it. Given that there is one each year, in 20 years, 28-30 teams will have a chairman's award under their belt and be qualified for nationals. 15 of which will qualify based on team number.

With FIRST's growth over the years, and Dean Kamen's goal to have the program to as many high schools as possible. I wouldn't be surprised at 3000+ teams in 20 years.
If the same qualification method is implemented, .5% (yes, half a percent) of the teams attending nationals will be pre-qualified because they won FIRST's highest honor.

If you feel this is wrong of FIRST to grant, I do not see a logical reason, nor your reason. (To the two votes for "no" so far)

Jessica - I understand your reasoning from the perspective of teams and students who work really hard to produce a winning robot, so that they can goto the championship in their off year (even/odd year).

If you want to make attendance at the championship genuinely fair to all teams then you must:

1. take away the even/odd freebee clause - only teams that qualify by virture of their performance can attend.

2. no more of this nonsense of teams going to more than one regional until they win - teams must only be allowed to attend THEIR regional - regional means YOUR AREA! teams would be required to attend the closest regional and they must WIN in order to attend the championship. Period!

so there was what? 20? 25 regionals this year? that means that 3*25 = 75 teams would advance to the championship. No other teams can attend.

Is this what you really want? Do we really want to turn FIRST into a robot building sport?

The error in your logic is thinking that teams work really hard to win the Chairmans award. Not true. The Chairmans award is about 40 cents worth of plastic. With a Chairmans award and 50 cents you can buy a cup of coffee :c)

Its not like the Nobel Prize in inspiration - you dont get $5 million along with the award -its not an award - its an honor - its formal recognition - and thats ALL it is.

Teams that won the chairmans award, all those things they did they did because those things are important to them - they WANTED to do those things - they did not do them to win any awards - they did them because those are the ideals that FIRST is built on - and they ARE FIRST.

To imply that a team will work really hard for one year to win the Chairmans award, and then 'rest' on their accomplishment - that is really a insult to the teams that hold those honors.

The Xcats have won twice - they are also a founding team - their sponsor is also a founding sponsor (they give more money directly to FIRST each year than they give to their OWN TEAM).

They have also directly inspired ALL the teams in the Rochester, NY area - we all learned about FIRST from the Xcats - if it werent for their incredible outreach effort the other teams in the area would not even exist (6 to 10 teams, depending on where you draw the 'area' boundary).

And if you go back and look carefully at the critera for winning the Chairmans award, you will learn there is not one single point related to robots, your robot, your teams placement at any competition this year or last years. You can place dead last at every regional you attend and STILL win the Chairmans award.

Let that sink in for a while, and you will get-it. The chairmans award is not about earning anything.

its not about winning anything.

its not about robots.

Its about what FIRST really is - its seems like the real purpose of FIRST has become its 'secret mission' [inspiration]