Well, it's been just over two years to the day since my wildly popular and hotly contested
Petition to end the shouting of ROBOT. Two years later, I can say it definitely has had a effect for the better, and I'm proud to have been the initiator of a national effort to improve the perception of our program by the general public.
This year, I began thinking about other things that perhaps are turning people away from wanting to be involved in this wonderful program we run. While attending events this year, I realized what some of these things are. We are a goofy bunch of folks, who have built a culture around celebration of what we do, in some strange ways that are not at all related to what we do. You all know what I'm referring to when I talk about the
pauses between the finals matches at regional events. It's the dances, to the same goofy songs every year.
And believe me, I have seen the pure and genuine joy and excitement on my student's faces when they're out there doing their thing, but to the unfamiliar observer, it is difficult to relate these goofy activities with a highly technical robotics competition. It's confusing, and hard to "get." I've been to other robotics competitions outside of the FIRST league, and they just don't have the same energy and appeal. But, I'm not convinced it's these silly songs and dances that make FIRST events what they are.
Why can't regionals run finals the way championship does, with awards between matches, instead of these goofy songs? Did we debate this before and I missed it?
And I strongly considered putting a question mark at the end of this thread title, because I'm not sure if it's something I feel as strongly about as I did the thing with yelling "robot" and I may get completely shut out disagreed with on this one. But let's get the dialog started nonetheless. I feel like this thread will result in much more debate, and much less clear of an answer than the previous one, but I'm curious what the rest of the community's opinion is.
And as a standard disclaimer, if this thread were to years from now result in any drastic culture shift in FIRST, I sincerely hope it's for the better.
Debate away!