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Unread 08-08-2008, 10:30
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Re: New FIRST competition structure in Michigan

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zflash View Post
However I still do not believe that it is right for a team to have a 1 in 18 chance to advance to the World Champinoships at 1 event, when all other teams only have a 1 in roughly 5 chance to advance at each event they go to.
Let me see if I can help with the 1:whatever numbers. At a traditional regional there are 6 slots that qualify for the Championship (3 winners, 1 Chairmans, 1 Engineering Inspriation?, and the Rookie Allstar). This means that at a 30 team regional you have a 1:5 (although rookies are the only ones able to get the Rookie slot). At a 60 team regional you have a 1:10. Even if you go 2 60 team regionals, your chances would be 1:10 + 1:10 = 1:5. In Michigan There will be 18 slots for 105-120 teams, or slightly less than 1:5. These slots are for the 6 slots x the 3 previous regionals. In order to qualify for the Championship in MI, you either need to go through the State championship (paying essentially the same price as 2 traditional events), or do your district and then go pay and win at an out-of state event.

For 2009, I would be willing to bet that 18 teams from Michigan will earn a slot, and another 20 or so will buy open slots for the Championship. Most of the Michigan teams that go to the Championship already do 2-3 events. The extra time on field is not a big benefit them (but it is a benefit). The extra time on field is a big benefit to the teams that usually only do 1 regional, then pack up and maybe get to do an off-season, maybe they decide the $6k, 6 weeks of tortue for 20 minutes of competition isn't worth it. In this system they should at a minimum have an opportunity for 60minutes of competition.

As Gary said: remember folks it is only a PILOT. Regardless of the outcome it will be an excellent learning experience to help figure out whether certain theoretical "improvements" are are worth making a permanent change.

If it goes bad only a small subset of FIRST has a bad experience, and everyone goes back to the regular system.
If it goes good, only a small subset gets and advantage for one year, but everyone will have learned important lessons for the future, and may see benefits if the overall structure changes for the positive.
If it is somewhere in between, everyone will have learned important lessons for the future.
Why only 1 state: In any Pilot you need a big enough effort to make sure that you have a realistic test model, but you need a small enough effort not to accidentally take down the whole thing.
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