[mathking]

My own feelings, expressed more than once here, is that I agree that there would be a higher percentage of "good" robots at competition if we got rid of stop build. There just doesn't seem to be any question, because the extra time is not going to hurt anyone on the average (sure there will be an occasional team that breaks something) because on the average more time will yield better robots. There is no down side to getting rid of stop build in terms of the quality of robots.

I also think it is pretty clear that getting rid of stop build day will lead to decreased participation. I don't buy that there are a lot of people out there who would participate but can't stand the time constraints and so they choose not to. But there will be lots of students and some mentors for whom the increased time commitment will be a deal breaker.

My team will keep doing FRC for the foreseeable future. I have at one time or another been involved in just about every big educational robotics competition in some way, and FRC is the one that generates the most interest and excitement. It is also the one that allows for the biggest team in terms of giving more kids what to do. If we got rid of stop build, however, I would have to find someone else to lead the team. And we would lose a lot of our members. So my preference is to keep stop build.

Side Note:
My ultimate (pipe??) dream would be that almost every school has a robotics team, like they have a basketball team, a soccer team, a band, a track team... FIRST could become the national organization that sets the rules, and they could host the Championship level event(s). Each state or region has its own governing body, like they do for athletics, and hosts its own tournaments. I won't lie, I would love to win an Ohio Capital Conference Robotics title before I retire. I think we have 8 teams now representing 16 high schools total, so we are getting to where that might be feasible.