[rachelholladay]

Honestly, I think a lot of people of my team never want to hear the word minibot in their life ever again. Every team I saw kept going back and rebuilding them between regionals or before CMP. Since the rules allowed you to hold back your minibot from ship, people kept working. I love build season just as much as the next fella, but this continuation seemed to disrupt the purpose of the 6 weeks.

After working as a volunteer at a regional (Bayou) three times and CMP twice, I would not favor a set time to connect. It isn't realistic. Every time we had to tell a team that they couldn't compete in a match because they couldn't connect, they got very angry. Although I definitely sympathized with them, some people let their behavior get our of control and lost sight of gracious professionalism. In my mind, a few minutes is worth letting people see their hard-work compete.

I agree that it would have been nice if they would have listed the reasons that people considered a second event to be a drag. I know last year, when we attended 2 regionals and CMP, a few of our mentors found it to be draining only because the amount of personal vacation time they used. We don't like to compete in only one regional. (Six weeks of work for only three days of competition, its over too soon!) The ticket to CMP is never guaranteed. (except for Hall of Fame and the Sustaining) Some members of our team shy away for going to two regionals because if we make it to CMP, it makes three events. However by only going to one regional there is the possibility that its your only event, if you don't make it CMP. Its a difficult decision we make every year, and its often decided by when our spring break falls in conjunction with the regionals. Our principal is more likely to let us go to two regionals if one is over spring break and therefore doesn't require missed school. Fortunately, he doesnt have a problem with us missing school for CMP because he realizes that its kinda sorta really important.