[JesseK]

Beth, thank you for posting this for us. I want to present another perspective as a case study into what I see going into this decision, as well as present 1885's experience with awards (albeit a subjective view I suppose). In addition, I want to say that it is my opinion that a team shouldn’t let a FIRST award, even national Chairman’s, drive their community involvement.

FTC vs VEX
The FTC/VEX decision has been on the entire county tech. board's minds since April and it's one that they don't know if they have all of the information to facilitate a proper discussion. I agree that it really is a tough decision. The county has actively funded a VEX-based curriculum in 11 middle schools and nearly every high school over the last two years. Due to funding and logistics of trips, they could only support 8 FTC registered high school teams in '07-'08.

As a mentor, I see that they have some options, and while some may view them as retrogressive we view them as progressive in the long term. After all in a budget shortfall the county found a way to add additional funding ($10's of k's) specifically for robotics in the '08-'09 school year. The only constant between the options is that for this coming year, our team and the county will probably cut back on the quantity of FTC teams until we further grow the overall technology curriculum. Right now we just can’t justify not using all of the VEX parts we’ve purchased and some of the funding needs to continue to support the VEX platform (broken motors, batteries, etc) as we transition to FTC. Regardless of its appearance to judges or the impact it will have on awards we win, this will probably happen.

Awards
Do FIRST judges look down on non-FIRST events when considering a team for an award? At regionals, they haven't in the past. Actually, the non-FIRST activities have greatly supplemented how teams have grown FIRST. In '06, '07, and '08 at the 6 regionals we attended the chairman's winners almost always had more involvement and impact in their community than just a FIRST-based involvement. However, don't get me wrong; the teams that won CA/EI also supported the growth of FIRST in one aspect or another.

In 1885's case, we created an underwater ROV curriculum that the county adopted for its 10 high schools (~550 students went through the class). From the classroom, we fielded 40 robots and held a local competition in April. After successfully managing the FIRST season and the SEAPerch competition concurrently, the county decided they want both. The educational benefit to cost ratio was astronomical when compared to FRC, and it has the ability to reach more students (on the order of two magnitudes more) because of it. However there isn't a program alive that can beat the quality of smaller, more intense groups in FTC and FRC (and NURC tbh), which the county also recognizes.

While the FIRST judges at our regionals enjoyed listening to us describe what we're doing with uROVs, they also wanted to know how we've grown FIRST and how we've tied FIRST to our community. In our presentation to the judges we showed how the concept of the SEAPerch curriculum is to get large numbers of freshmen students involved in technology very quickly within the county's budget, and in later years (Soph/Jr/Sr) get as many as we could handle involved in FTC & FRC.

My own thoughts (not necessarily 1885's or the county's)
For our efforts we won VCU Engineering Inspiration in '08, and we will continue to grow the overall technology involvement in the schools in '09. The conclusion I drew at the end of the FRC & SEAPerch seasons was that even if 1885 doesn't win another FIRST award, the students in our county will still come out winners because of the impact 1885 and its leadership, mentors, and students have had. The enrollment in the sophomore level of IT/Tech courses is up over 200% county-wide for the '08-'09 school year, which will lead to greater growth for FIRST anyways. Some students want to compete in FRC, and some students want to do a smaller-scope program (either another SEAPerch bot or FTC) so they may also do other school activities such as sports or other clubs. In the greater perspective of things, it really makes the immediate FTC/VEX decision we face seem moot for a moment because either way we’re making progress.

At the end of the day, it really isn’t about the awards.