[Chris is me]

I just want to add one quick note to this discussion, having participated in regionals for 7 years and then districts for 1 year now. People talk about the quality of district events versus regionals as if you have to give up the regional feel to do districts. That really isn't true. For one thing, the District Championships tend to have either the same or better production value compared to a regional. So you still have that 60 team event with thousands of screaming kids in a stadium to change lives and invite sponsors to and stuff. That doesn't go away.

And some district events feel basically identical to small regionals anyway. District events at colleges or community colleges are pretty much the same as a regional event at a college or community college. If you walked into the Rhode Island District Event and the Tech Valley Regional, the only immediately noticeable difference is that Tech Valley has the Show Ready lighting.

Even at the high school gym level, sponsors are impressed by district events. The company I work for sends some volunteers to the local district competitions regularly, and they certainly aren't turned off by the high school feel. They see kids and engineers working side by side on machines and playing matches with robots. That's cool no matter how you dress it up.

Districts are worth it. You can make the events as snazzy and fancy as you want to - no one's forcing you to give anything up in the District system - but I also think you're overstating the necessity of every event being a 60+ team event in a big stadium with fancy lights. You're also ignoring the current reality that many regionals are already run "like districts", and those kids aren't walking away any less inspired.