[EricH]

I've seen a lot of seating discussion over the years. I think what we've got right now is the worst possible way, except for all the others.

Open seating--teams save seats (against the rules) and won't let anybody not with their team sit with them. Students also sit in the aisles--not cool. Later-arriving teams get whatever's left; spectators get locked out; potentially, teams get split up. (Current method)

"Cheering section" seating--you have the "fun" of moving 6 teams in and 6 teams out of seats with a good view. You also get more of saving seats, as teams have nowhere to sit when they aren't playing--unless they save a block of seats. The other alternative that I've seen is a standing cheering/dancing section if the bleachers don't go to the floor--usually better traffic flow.

"Scouting section" seating--This one may work, except for a couple of details. First, most teams use somewhere around 6-10 scouts, who may or may not also be the cheering section, if they scout at all. This means that you should figure, say, 240-400 seats at a district event alone (though that could probably be dropped by 100 at any given event). Second, most teams like to sit together--hence the seat saving mentioned earlier. I don't think they'll like to be split up, meaning that the mad rush will be for the seats right behind the scouts.

"Spectator seating"--IMO, a spectators-only zone should be small. My opinion (not that I've been just a spectator at all) is that spectators often get the most fun/inspiration out of the event by sitting WITH some of the teams, asking them questions. Saying "You have to be in this area down front" cuts off that whole aspect--in addition to potentially scooping up team-associated parents.

"Block seat", or "sectional seating", or "lottery"--Ugh. This one's a pretty big mess. If all the teams were the same size, and sat during all the matches, this could work out. The problem is, neither is the truth. There are teams with 60-100 team members--not counting parents, I presume--and there are teams with 10 team members. Then you get the parents added on, and outside spectators. So now you get the problems: Divvying up the seats into blocks, distributing the blocks so everybody gets a fair crack at decent seats, dealing with the complaints from team X that team Y stood during the entirety of their matches so team X, who wasn't in a decent place to begin with, couldn't see a thing, and all that sort of "fun".



All that said, I think there is a solution. It's in the "open seating" model--and yet, it's not in that model at all. It's in the people.

What if...
--Everyone got in line at the doors and walked, not ran, to the seats/pits?
--Seat savers took a smaller amount of seats, leaving some on the aisles and other "boundaries" as "mixing" seats?
--Other teams and spectators were welcomed into the "mixing" seats, not chased away by seat savers?
--Teams that stand through their matches intentionally took the top seats or seats around the sides?


What if FIRSTers actually practiced some Gracious Professionalism in the stands? And yes, there are teams that do that now. How about some of the rest of the teams joining in?