Quote:
Originally Posted by M. Krass
Last season, I would never have imagined our team would win the Engineering Inspiration Award at the Silicon Valley Regional, and had I similarly been asked to identify which awards we were in contention for, I would have omitted it. This question, thus, gives me pause that if I had done so, judges would've spent less time speaking with our students and evaluating our program and its suitability for that award. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
The judges are meant to have a complete understanding of the awards they must present and really ought to be capable of identifying and investigating teams that meet the criteria for each award. I see that this might be a way to make their job easier -- but having judged FLL events -- I don't think their job should be easy. It should be the hardest job at the event and I'd hate to think that a great part of someone's robot or team goes overlooked because they didn't realize it was something special.
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Well stated!
Ideally this category would allow the judges to make sure that they ask about a particular robot or team element that the team believes to be special without causing them to narrow their vision down to only elements highlighted here. Team members should already be aware of these elements and be able to talk about them without being asked directly so I think your concern regarding the use of the answers to this question is a very valid one.
I will definitely be talking to my team about what we want to put in this box, if we want to fill it at all. Unfortunately, with the existence of the box it makes me wonder what kind of attention we will get (or lack thereof) from judges by leaving it blank.