[Meredith Novak]

There are certainly many reasons not to bother with a Regional Chairman’s Award Submission this year. It really is too difficult to get this done while you are doing the impossible work of designing, building, and testing a robot with impossible constraints of time, resources, energy, etc.

We all know that a Chairman’s Submission is grueling, impossible work: like everything else in FIRST, like everything else that’s worth anything in life. So go watch American Idol, play with your WII and see where that gets you.

Or consider these reasons to do more impossible work and submit for an RCA:

1. It is a requirement of Nasa grant teams. Congratulations to these teams and, since the hardest part of Chairman’s is deciding to do it, you are one step ahead of everyone else.

2. Rookie teams cannot win a RCA, but the submission is used to judge the Rookie All-Star Award - which qualifies a rookie team to attend the championship.

3. A shameless chance-of-winning-an-award argument: Since so few teams are preparing a Chairman’s submission, you have a much higher chance (by numbers) of winning this award than any of the other awards handed out at a regional. Hopefully we can reverse this trend, so you better take advantage of it now!

4. It is not really doing something more, it is documenting and showing off what you have done. We are a community. We all have the responsibility to share our experiences and earned wisdom.

5. Your team will have a scheduled interview with the judges. Even if you don’t win the RCA, it can’t but help your chances to be recognized for the great work you have done. It is very difficult for the judges to get good information on all the teams from the pit visits. This personal time with the judges is in itself very rewarding for the team – the judges are always so encouraging.

6. An RCA presentation and the preparation will give your team members something (intelligent and interesting) to talk about when the judges come by the pit and say, “tell me about your team.”

7. Also one student on the Championship Chairman’s Award team will receive the Allaire Medal which comes with a $10,000 scholarship!

So get even busier and inspire us!

Please pm me if you need help, encouragement, editing…this is what I do. If you have a Chairman’s mentor, thank them. If you don’t, let me know and I will do what I can from here.