FRC Blog - District Slot Allocations at 2015 FIRST Championship

[cgmv123]

http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...T-Championship

We have determined FIRST Championship allocations for Districts as noted in this blog.

The relevant portion of the blog is this –

Districts will be getting the number of available Championship slots (total Championship capacity less the number of pre-qualified teams) proportional to their percentage representation in all FRC. As an example, if a District has 10% of the teams in FRC, they will be getting 10% of the available slots. This is similar to what was done last year, but this year, the allocation will be done on current season - 2015 - team counts.

We informed Districts some time ago that we would be taking a ‘snapshot’ of registered FRC teams who had paid their registration fee, both at the District and overall FRC level, on December 9, to determine FIRST Championship allocations. We set this date for a few reasons. We wanted to encourage Districts to work with their teams and funding agencies to get payments in by this date to ensure teams would receive their kits at Kickoff and not have to pay the extra money required to have kits shipped individually. When kits are shipped individually, of course, teams receive them after Kickoff, which means lost time on top of the additional team expense. Also, we thought Districts and teams would be very interested in where they stood regarding their allocations, and wanted to get them the information as soon as we could after giving a reasonable time for payments to be received.

The results are below. You will note we have included two values for one of the necessary figures – how many FRC teams we will actually be hosting at the FIRST Championship. That information will be coming out shortly. Instead, we have given a range. Actual district allocations will fall within this range.


(Click to zoom)

The number of ‘available’ slots at Championship is the total number of slots available minus the 30 active pre-qualified teams. District allocation is determined by District percentage of the number of available slots at Championship, not the number of total slots. Pre-qualified teams do not count against the District allocation, so essentially the Districts will be sending their allocation plus their pre-qualified teams. The complete list of pre-qualified teams can be found here.

Frank

[PVCpirate]

"We're gonna need a bigger boat" - Michigan State Championship Planning Committee.

[Basel A]

540 is divisible by 6, but not 8.

Originally Posted by PVCpirate

"We're gonna need a bigger boat" - Michigan State Championship Planning Committee.

<rumours> Two fields and 114 teams seems boat enough. </rumours>

[cgmv123]

Originally Posted by Basel A

540 is divisible by 6, but not 8.

The blog implies the number of teams at Championship will be between 540 and 600, not 540 or 600.

[Peyton Yeung]

Indiana is getting a slightly smaller number of slots than last year.

[avanboekel]

Originally Posted by Peyton Yeung

Indiana is getting a slightly smaller number of slots than last year.

Right, but you won't have out of state teams competing with you. It will be exclusively Indiana teams.

Edit: Also, only 9 teams made champs from Indiana on merit last year. You guys should be even better represented this year. (45 pre-qualified).

Edit 2: looks like 868 got a wildcard slot at QC

[Caleb Sykes]

Originally Posted by Peyton Yeung

Indiana is getting a slightly smaller number of slots than last year.

There were 10 Indiana teams that attended championships last year:
447
868
5010
4982
1501
45
135
3147
3301
5188

[MechEng83]

Originally Posted by inkling16

There were 10 Indiana teams that attended championships last year:
447
868
5010
4982
1501
45
135
3147
3301
5188

45 is an original/sustaining team, so they don't count against our quota.

If you look at it in a different light, if you combine the 2 regionals and their 12 qualification slots, but then eliminate the duplicate RCA, EI, and RAS (since the district will only have 1 of each), you get 9 unique spots. I had hoped for more slots, but the proportional representation seems fair.

[ehochstein]

This is more of an incentive to switch to districts in large areas.

For example, in MN we send a maximum of 24 teams to champs under the regional system. At each event we can qualify a Regional Chairman's Award Winner, Engineering Inspiration Award Winner, the winning alliance and possibly a Rookie All-Star. 6*4 = 24.

Using the numbers that Frank posted and assuming that all the teams are paid for, we would advance 35/39 teams if we were in districts.

192/2989 = .06765
.06765*570 = 38.56
.06765*510 = 34.5

Let me know if I did my math wrong.

[MrRoboSteve]

Originally Posted by Wiifi

This is more of an incentive to switch to districts in large areas.

For example, in MN we send a maximum of 24 teams to champs under the regional system. At each event we can qualify a Regional Chairman's Award Winner, Engineering Inspiration Award Winner, the winning alliance and possibly a Rookie All-Star. 6*4 = 24.

Using the numbers that Frank posted and assuming that all the teams are paid for, we would advance 35/39 teams if we were in districts.

192/2989 = .06765
.06765*570 = 38.56
.06765*510 = 34.5

Let me know if I did my math wrong.

Two things. Not sure if you are, but ND should be included in an MN region as most of their attendance is at MN regionals.

Secondly, more non-MN teams can emerge from MN regionals than the opposite.

Non-(MN, ND) teams at MN-hosted Regionals (total 27):
Lake Superior - 7
North Star - 7
10000 Lakes - 5
Northern Lights - 8

counterbalanced by (MN, ND) teams at non-MN hosted Regionals:

Wisconsin - 11
Others?

[cadandcookies]

Originally Posted by MrRoboSteve

counterbalanced by (MN, ND) teams at non-MN hosted Regionals:

Wisconsin - 11
Others?

I know 2220 will be at Central Illinois this year. Not sure about others.

[BJT]

Originally Posted by cadandcookies

I know 2220 will be at Central Illinois this year. Not sure about others.

2512, 4009, and 876 will be there with you.

[cadandcookies]

Originally Posted by cadandcookies

I know 2220 will be at Central Illinois this year. Not sure about others.

So, after posting this, I decided to check out where MN teams were competing. Using Ed Law's spreadsheet, I found all the MN teams, then went through the regionals to find how many teams were competing where. Here's a small breakdown on that, if anyone is interested:

Out of the 191 teams listed, MN teams are competing at exactly 6 regionals:

Lake Superior     : 55
Northern Lights   : 50
Central Illinois  : 3
Wisconsin         : 10
10K Lakes         : 58
North Star        : 52

Also looking at the number of regionals MN teams are competing at, there is 1 team competing at 3 regionals, 15 teams competing at 2 regionals, and the rest are competing at a single regional.

Amusingly, this shows that even if MN teams took up all available champs qualifications slots at each of the tournaments they attended, the state would still only send 33 teams, almost a full regional-worth less than we would under a proportional district scheme. As it is, I'd anticipate it to be more around 20-25 teams sent, making it probably the 8th or 9th year in a row that MN has been underrepresented at Championships

EDIT: Here are the numbers with ND:

Lake Superior     : 56
Northern Lights   : 52
Central Illinois  : 4
Wisconsin         : 11
10K Lakes         : 58
North Star        : 52

1 team with 3 regionals
17 teams with 2 regionals
176 teams with 1 regional

[MamaSpoldi]

Originally Posted by Peyton Yeung

Indiana is getting a slightly smaller number of slots than last year.

The same was true of the New England District last year based on the number of slots generated by the regional events that were being replaced by the district. Growing pains.

Overall, separate from the ability of any particular team to make it to Championships, the NE district teams got a good deal more play time than in previous years for a lower cost. (We had a good year and ended up running in more than 120 matches!) That is a win.

[dellagd]

Um, doesn't this mean there's probably going to be 6 divisions next year or is this old news? I know it was hinted at in the past. 600 in total vs 400 in total.