Quote:
Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber
Unpopular suggestion that is probably borderline crazy... The scale of MN presents an issue, they would need at least 2 events a week during competition to go to districts. From some mapping I did a couple weeks ago I noticed that the overwhelming majority of MN teams are fairly clustered. I propose a reduction in team population in the short term (3-5 years). Merging together multiple teams would result in smaller team populations, likely reduce strain on smaller teams and reduce competition for sponsors. It could also make it feasible to transition to the District model due to reduced event requirements.
If you say that the volunteer base can support 8 events... reduce to 160 teams. It should be possible.
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I work with a lot of different FRC teams in Minnesota, often times I get the late night phone call or email from a coach that needs help installing labview on their computer, or needs help figuring out how to CAD or just wants general support on building, programming or wiring of their robot. During the build season I'll be up late at night answering these emails trying to support teams to the best of my ability. Currently we don't have enough experience in Minnesota to truly run 192 FRC teams the way they are supposed to be run, in my opinion, about 50 of the teams are missing out on the full FRC inspiration and experience due to not having enough experience in the state. If you were to reduce the number of teams and switch to districts at the same time, you could more effectively reach and inspire the students Minnesota. You would be getting more bang for your buck.
I said it once and I'll say it again, the biggest issue with MN not going to districts at the moment is the fact we don't have a non-profit. We could have all of the volunteers in the world but if we don't have an organization running it, we will still not have districts.
Quote:
Originally Posted by DareDad
The volunteer issue is one thing and over 3 or 4 years could be addressed.
The bigger issue to me though is keeping it loud. Last year, Minnesota had 4 regionals. The two Duluth regionals are held under one roof, with 123 teams last year in the DECC. The Minneapolis regionals are held in two buildings next door to each other again with 123 teams last year.
Both of those events get real media attention. The local papers and television stations do stories on the events every year. In Duluth, one of the local teams has partnered with the newspaper to put a wrap over the paper during the event so everyone who gets a paper knows what's going on at the DECC that week.
That's not loud, that's LOUD. 
Minnesota would lose that going to districts.
People talk about how districts are awesome because teams get two plays where they'll see maybe 60 or 70 different teams across those events. But in Minnesota there's already 122 other teams at these double regionals. It would be a step backward for teams in Minnesota.
Not to mention, we've had Chinese, and Turkish teams at Minnesota events. We've had the Hawaiian Kids out. We'd lose those international and long distance participants if we went to districts.
Quite frankly FIRST should be using Minnesota as a model for the rest of the program, not trying to move Minnesota away from what is currently the loudest program in the world. |
Who won the Make it Loud Award at championships last year and what state was he from? What was the reasoning he won the Make it Loud Award?
Here is a link if you don't remember.
As a coach of a FRC team in Minnesota I feel it would be a step forward to switch to districts. Right now, my team gets 10 qualification matches in a good year for $5000, if we were in districts, we would be getting 24 matches for the same amount of money. In addition to that, there would be a potential to host a district event at our high school on a Friday which would in turn cause the school population as a whole to get more involved. Our cafeteria is right next to the Main Gym and it is pretty much impossible to miss anything going on in the gym during lunch.