Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

If my team won an award, the LAST thing I'd want the spectators to do would be stand up and act obnoxious. This behavior is usually seen in the middle of matches anyway when people are standing up obstructing the field of view and screaming loudly blocking out both the field and what the announcer is saying. I think that if there were a top 100 list of things NOT graciously professional, screaming and acting infantile would top my list most definately.
I should hope that there could possibly be less screaming/shouting/dancing next year but that isnt going to happen.
The only reason people scream is to hope they get the spirit award.
I stand by my beleifs and don't doubt that my team feels the same way.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

I can honestly say that MOE did not want to win the spirit award this year, we cheer to show our support our team and also other teams. If you don't like the cheering go and do science Olympiad or something. FIRST is about having fun and showing respect for others. Would you like us to all be quite and now show our enthusiasm for what we spent 6 weeks working extremely hard on?

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

fyi I am in science olympiad and they act much more mature in that organization.
I just wish that people could just sit and calm down and just clap like normal, sane human beings. I don't think that in the entirety of that entire competition (including regionals) that I have ever raised the decibals of my voice to an extent which exceeds the appropriate level. I have told many people to sit down when I was trying to write down important scouting information. I couldve just stood up in that situation, but that would obstruct the people who are sitting behind me's view.
I think that the most graciously professional thing you can do is not act like barbaric individuals, which is what the majority of the other teams behave like during (and sometimes after) matches.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Cheering is good, standing ovations are good. I'm somewhat questionable about forced standing ovations, but whatever floats your boats. However, atleast have the consideration to sit down afterwards. Yeah, consideration. For the people that can't stand up and sit down 20 or more times in a row. There are older mentors sitting behind some of you young whippersnappers and some of them had a rough enough day being on their feet for 10+ hours. Asking them to stand up a bazillion times just cause you aren't polite enough to sit back down after a bit is rather rude, I think. Just my $.02 though.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Wow. This hits a whole new level.
I doubt that the team, whether their ovation was 'forced' or not, was not screaming and acting infantile. Have you ever encountered the team in question?

So, you think that people only scream to get the spirit award. Regardless of their intent, do you think this adds to the excitement of a match? It feels so great to win an award, look in the stands, and see other people cheering for you. I think this is a big part of why IRI is such a successful event- the teams are professional and courteous, and since many of them have been competing at the event for years, they all applaud for each other's match wins and awards.

And let's go over what was probably meant by 'forced'. This doesn't mean that there was a mentor barking at the students every time an award was announced, it probably means that it was a team decision that they should honor everyone who won an award. Many teams do that. No matter what the award is, no matter whom the team is, it stands that the judges give out awards to those that they believe are most deserving... so shouldn't we applaud that the most innovative/enthusiastic/best rookie got the award?

I'm not saying you should do the same... I'm saying you probably shouldn't knock those who do. And while you're pretty confident that your team will agree with you, I have little sympathy for your 'beleifs'. What's the solution here? Tell that team that they should purposely get the worst seats in the Dome, so that they can cheer for their fellow competitors without disrupting people who have been on their feet? I guess you shouldn't sit behind them next year. Lesson learned.

I can't believe this is even an issue.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Sitting there calmly and clapping normal doesn't make you mature at all. I know the most infantile of kids do it. This is a COMPETITION. The "Super Bowl of Smarts". What do you think the appropriate noise volume is? What right do you hold to say that people should act "normal, sane human beings" if you obviously don't know what FIRST is about. If you can't see that cheering loudly, having fun is not "barbaric" then you should look a little closer to yourself about being immature.

I really find it ironic how at 15 you can tell people, who have been in this program nearly as long as you have been ALIVE, they are rude and barbaric!

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Considering that the Technokats are one of the most respected teams in all of FIRST and you just labeled them barbarians is pretty inane kid. I recommend you quit while you're ahead.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

I have read every post in this thread and I want to post at least 2 of my comments.

allyphant said:I could not agree more with allyphant. High school students today are extremely smart and talented. Why do some teams not let the students create and repair the robot? A few pits in Atlanta had guys over 40 working on the robots with not a student around. From what I have heard there is at least one team that the students don't get any hands on the robot until it is time to drive it.

One of our team mentors, Jeremy Roberts, CD forum member and the chair of the Peachtree Regional planning committee, asked 3 questions of everyone at the end of The Peachtree Regional. He said if you can answer YES to any of these questions you have succeeded here today.

• Did you fix something that broke on your robot?

• Did you make a mistake and learn from it?

• Did you build a robot that you are proud of?

Let the students build and repair the robots. They are our future and they can do it. If they are stuck with a problem then let the mentors step in. Our team had a pretty tough year with our robot but the team learned a lot. We had a fantastic robot but had some nagging problems. We were the competition winners at the Peachtree last year, did not perform as well this year but our students created and worked on the robot each time. Trust the students, they can do it with minimal help from mentors!

Also, a couple of people here have made negative comments on the announcer Sir Charles. He has done play by play of the Peachtree at least the past 2 years and also been at the Championship's each year. This guy is a class act and brings a lot more excitement to the game so I could not disagree more with the small minority that said they didn't care for him!
Dave

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

To quote from the Manual: "This award celebrates extraordinary enthusiasm and spirit through an exceptional partnership and teamwork." It does not say anything about screaming the loudest at a competition. Unfortunately it is often awarded to the team who cheers the best during competition and so we have all assumed that it what it was designed to reward. At Chesapeake it was correctly awarded to a team that was kind of quiet during competition, but who overcame adversity and showed exceptional teamwork. So we don't scream because we want to win an award, we scream because the event is exciting. We dye our hair in team colors, paint our faces, wear strange things hanging from our earlobes and our necks, weigh ourselves down with team buttons, wear socks in striped colors, and put pom poms on our sneakers. Because it's fun to do.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

All I've got to say is you should try showing some emotion sometime. You might actually enjoy it.

Teams cheer beacuse they care. Not cheering for your team would be a way of showing you do not care.

FYI - I think you're one of the few who doesn't care.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

"Required"?

I didn't hear anyone giving instructions to the kids, either during or prior to the finals, telling them they had to stand for the awards. It just seemed to be a natural and spontaneous thing to do, at least for me, and I imagine it was the same with most of the other mentors and veteran students.

How would you prefer we show our enthusiasm and appreciation for the award-winning teams? This is a high-energy sporting event, not a piano recital. :)

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

i would agree with alan, teams should be showing their enuthusiasm and being spirited. This is supposed to be an exciting competition not formal one. Trying to take the spirit out of first would just be killing it.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

YES!.. i 100% agree with taht.. considering the magnitude of the 30point penalties especially (hitting robot in loading zone, we hit once and they were not in process of loading, they just moved onto there to get in our way)
. . .. .. the inconsistancy at the toronto vs GLr regional stunk. . at GLR the refs were awsome.. they looked like veterans.. at toronto.. they all looked like.. 20s... !.. and as such they made some REALLY bad calls, not only for our team, but for many others that i watched.. it was horrible.

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Think back to the award presentations. Look around you, beyond your own team. Notice the hordes of students standing up and cheering the winners. Please don't confuse energetic enthusaism with acting obnoxious. At fifteen, you're much too young to be so stodgy. :)

I seem to recall you once mentioning that your team members consider it taboo to interact with "outsiders", and now you're telling us that they think displaying spirit should be discouraged? I think there's something very wrong with that attitude, and I think you should talk to your mentors -- and have them talk to other teams' mentors -- to try to find out if you're "just not getting it". Not to put too fine a point on it, but if you're that uncomfortable with the amount of jumping up and down that goes on at a FIRST event, you might want to consider focusing on the chess team instead of the robotics team. :p

Re: Lessons learned 2005: The negative
 

Many of my complaints have already been discussed, such as the long queuing times, which could definitely be handled better.

Here's the rest of my list:

Nearly all the announcing on Curie was not understandable. It sounded like they were yelling into mikes causing incredible distortion. Viewers at home on NASA TV or the Internet felt the same.

The NASA broadcast was terrible, switching fields mid-match, no scores, and the real time scoring (which as already discussed was often wrong) taking up much of the screen. My wife said it would turn off anyone not involved in the program, not excite them to get involved.

The lack of ranking information or even the elimination brackets on the field screen was annoying, but not having updated and correct rankings and awards on the website for our press connections was yet again a real miss. Try explaining results to a reporter who keeps repeating, "but the website says this.." and you get the idea. FIRST still needs a system to generate official press releases immediately after every event. Perhaps that's a project for Google...

The peviously unscheduled, excessively long drivers meeting which conflicted with many teams' planned events was a real annoyance as well. Maybe some of it was useful, but the part I saw was pretty much a waste of time.

Overall the event was successful and a lot of fun. I do plan on posting in the positive thread tonight or during lunch tomorrow.