[waialua359]

Originally Posted by Jared341

Please let me clear some things up.

I said that we need to make hard choices about who gets in. This does not mean that I think you must be an elite robot to be invited. If it did, well, then 341 would not have been at the Championship many of the years we have been, and we would not be the team we are today. It means exactly what I said: we have to make hard choices! The best system I have seen for making these choices is the FIM/MAR system, which uses points accumulated over the course of a season (incorporating BOTH robot performance and off-the-field accomplishments, with automatic advancement for the highest culture changing awards) to select the most deserving teams in a given year.

To be clear, I do not think we were we impacted at all by unlucky alliance pairings (heck, we had the 5th easiest schedule in Newton by OPR). There were a couple of other specific teams I had in mind when I made the second part of my statement, which I concede was not tactfully articulated. It is not FIRST's obligation that the best robot seeds #1. But, on the other hand: There is a C in FRC, and the C is the biggest reason we are as popular as we are. The C is also our best shot at actually transforming the culture on a macro scale, because the sports model is something the public actually gets.

There is a knob we need to tune. On one end, every FRC team who is able to, comes to Championships and plays a single match. On the other end, only the 24 best robots in the world show up and they play 20+ qualification matches each. All I am arguing is that 400+ teams and 8 matches is not the optimal spot on the continuum, especially for $5000 per team. I do not think you should need to be elite to come to St. Louis, but when I know for a fact that there are teams who did not make the cut who can score lots of game pieces, who have done tremendous things in their communities and schools, and have changed lives and cultures - why are there still robots that can't score a game piece at the World Championships?

Jared, I'm with you on this one.

5000 for 8 matches and coming from Hawaii especially, is NOT acceptable.
If this means adding an extra day, or less teams competing, so be it.
If it means I have to win at events and not get the HOF exemption, then so be it. If my robot is poor, I won't subject our team to getting blown out.
If it means that if RCA's win, they compete only with the Other RCA's in a judges room, then so be it.
This is a competition event!
Champs is a big deal. Excuses that I can't get off work another day is a personal problem. For an event as inspiring as this, and a once in a lifetime opportunity for kids, you make the necessary sacrifices to make it happen.
It's my job to use it to inspire kids all of the other zillion of hours I put in to take care of the learning part!