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Unread 21-04-2014, 13:35
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Jon Stratis Jon Stratis is offline
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FRC #2177 (The Robettes)
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Re: Suggestion for a new overall approach

Quote:
Originally Posted by Citrus Dad View Post
You're making the same mistake that many people make--assume that individuals will somehow decide to do the right thing voluntarily including taking the effort to gather information and to then process it. As a professional economist, I see many studies that show that this is a false assumption. To make a policy work effectively, you need to provide people with information and give them default choices that drive them toward the preferred choice. In fact, taking an opposite tack can drive them toward the opposite decision (and is just as much external decision making as the first case.)

So this includes actively sending a list of new teams, not waiting on existing teams to take the added effort of looking up what new teams are registered. In addition, there's a lag between when a team is actually formed and going and when it shows up on registration--a lag that can be critical. Also, the regional director can inform existing teams about informal new teams to help accelerate the process.

While some teams do reach out and they are rewarded through Chairman's, relying on volunteer charity is not a good policy. As I mentioned earlier, Hal Varian, Chief CIO at Google, wrote a paper in 1986 showing this is not a socially optimal or preferred policy and such support is underprovided by relying solely on voluntary action. The point is that "many" teams is still not "enough" teams. We know that many more teams could be helping, and giving them stronger incentives to do so can boost this. Relying solely on Chairman's isn't enough due to the low probability of winning for most teams and great effort for submission.

BTW, a ranking system isn't too difficult to create. Use regional winners and finalist plus award winners.
You can't legislate culture. FIRST is all about changing the culture, inspiring Gracious Professionalism, and provides incentive for teams to do the right thing through awards. There's nothing wrong with providing incentive, but assigning teams to be mentors is not the right way for FIRST to go about it. FIRST provides all the information it can in a way that is easily searchable, and I know a lot of local area teams that help rookies.

As for your ranking system... I know regional winners I would not recommend mentor other teams. They may end up with a robot good enough to be on the winning alliance, but that doesn't mean they have a program that can adequately support and train a rookie team. I also know many teams that win awards but have robot issues every single year - they would not be a good match for helping a rookie team get something built. I also know teams that fall into both these categories, yet would not be willing to do more than a token e-mail to a rookie team if FIRST required it.

Just this past year MN set up a system of "hubs", designed to help rookies, organize team assistance, and otherwise increase the level of competition across the state. The system was set up via an opt-in approach, where a number of teams were invited to an initial meeting and signed up to be "hub leaders". Those teams contacted other teams in their area to start setting up hub activities and get the ball rolling, and it's worked out great - I know I've attended mentor gatherings for two different hubs and been able to give advise on specific issues teams were facing all season. The hub my team is in had several events, including group strategy sessions, group build sessions, and group Chairman's preparation. All on a volunteer basis with no incentive for the teams involves beyond what FIRST already provides with awards at the regionals.
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2007 - Present: Mentor, 2177 The Robettes
LRI: North Star 2012-2016; Lake Superior 2013-2014; MN State Tournament 2013-2014, 2016; Galileo 2016; Iowa 2017
2015: North Star Regional Volunteer of the Year
2016: Lake Superior WFFA