Bills Blog - Champs info

[AndyH]

Because of the timing this year, we are having a hard time getting students excused from school. AP exams begin the following week, and teachers, parents, and the students are having reservations about missing the review. I wish that FIRST would keep the focus on them, but I agree with the poster above who said that the focus seems to be changing. It's too bad, because the kids put time into it for the payoff of the matches, not a concert.

[thefro526]

Originally Posted by David Brinza

What about Dean's homework? Are we attracting spectators to FIRST events who are NOT part of a team? A free concert could certainly boost the crowd in the Dome. But will those spectators be engaged by the robotics competition or the FIRST program? Or worse, could this create crowd control and security issues?

I hope that no one takes this the wrong way, but:

If I or my team are unable to find seats for the finals because there are hundreds or thousands of spectator that just came to see Will.I.Am or whatever performer, perform - I'm going to start looking into other programs, after raising all hell.

Seriously, I feel that it's disrespectful to teams to move fields around just to make room for some entertainer. Teams are going to COMPETE and paid a lot of money and worked extremely hard to do so - the only thing that a live musical guest is going to do is piss a ton of people off - including myself.

If anything, moving fields around or out of the dome to make room for a large stage for Entertainment seems to go against everything that FIRST says that their for. I thought we were going to change the culture, not have the culture change us.

I don't see why they don't have the Finale Party inside of the same building in which the pits are housed, I'm sure there will be an open room or two that are large enough to accommodate everyone along with a decent sized stage. I'm pretty sure this is what was done in Atlanta when the weather was too nasty for people to be outside.

[Nemo]

I would agree that moving competition fields around for an entertainer is pretty distasteful, if that is what is happening. If they are giving FLL / FTC a bigger stage for Friday, that seems understandable.

If they have a big name entertainer there to draw people in during the finals, is that going to result in a significant number of people joining FIRST programs? I'd guess that the organizers asked that question and determined that the answer was "yes" and planned their logistics accordingly.

[Chris is me]

I don't know why everyone's running with the "FIRST has a big performer coming!" rumor, but right now it is nothing more than pure speculation, with no evidence to suggest that is what happening. Let's wait to criticize FIRST on that issue until it actually happens...

[Katie_UPS]

Originally Posted by AndyH

Because of the timing this year, we are having a hard time getting students excused from school. AP exams begin the following week, and teachers, parents, and the students are having reservations about missing the review. I wish that FIRST would keep the focus on them, but I agree with the poster above who said that the focus seems to be changing. It's too bad, because the kids put time into it for the payoff of the matches, not a concert.

Our team (and I assume many others) is having the same problem with our IB. Roughly 24 hours after we get home from St. Louis, our seniors have to take their first exam. Not to mention we're missing reviews that will cover the two-three years of content on the exams. Luckily, the seniors on our team have already prepared for this: we're having our own study/review sessions.

It would be pretty nice if FIRST could accomodate for these very expensive and important tests. As is, FIRST doesn't give me college credit :/

[Nick Lawrence]

April 20 can't come soon enough...

-Nick

[Nuttyman54]

Update on the blog:

http://frcdirector.blogspot.com/2011...ion.html#links

I sincerely hope the reason they only have 3 fields in the dome is NOT for the entertainment reasons stated above.

[Nick Lawrence]

Originally Posted by Nuttyman54

Update on the blog:

http://frcdirector.blogspot.com/2011...ion.html#links

I sincerely hope the reason they only have 3 fields in the dome is NOT for the entertainment reasons stated above.

After reading this I'm seriously thinking champs is just going to be a mess. The focus clearly isn't on the competition anymore...

-Nick

[Chris is me]

I like how there's an available field on the Dome floor they're not using.

[Justin Montois]

I can't believe that some teams will win their division on a field in the pits. Oh, and bleacher seats are most comfortable. 86 teams on two spans of bleachers? Oh joy.

Horrible.

[IndySam]

Originally Posted by Chris is me

I like how there's an available field on the Dome floor they're not using.

How is this any different than Atlanta?

[George A.]

After reading the update to the blog, I'm even more upset/worried about the Championship.

He clarified and said that Eliminations will be held in the pits? How do we decide which to divisions are relegated to the pits, and which two get the "high profile" (his words) fields in the dome? Granted it's an honor to compete in the Championships, but the fact that half of the competitions will be behind the scenes and not in plain view for spectators is kind of contrary to the point isn't it?

And I also agree with Dustin in the fact that if we are going through this rigamaroll all because a musical group has to have a certain sized stage for their closing act...then we might be more lost than originally anticipated.

[JohnBoucher]

The only thing we know for sure is that someone at HQ is reading ChiefDelphi and is taking it seriously. That's FANTASTIC!!!!!

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by IndySam

How is this any different than Atlanta?

In Atlanta they don't need to shuttle people to the pits to play matches?

The bleacher set up they have advertised is a smaller version of the bleachers at the CT regional. These bleachers were not big enough for only 60 teams.

[Cory]

All the speculation about why there are real fields in the pits is basically unfounded, but no matter the reason it comes down to this for me:

FRC is FIRST's marquee event. I appreciate that FTC and FLL kids put a ton of work into their respective events, but if FIRST wants to be big time, be on major television networks and get the kind of exposure real sports get, they need to have their marquee program front and center. ESPN is not going to waste half a second thinking about putting some boring FTC bots on live (or tape delayed) TV.

So essentially regardless of the reason for the move of 2 fields, FIRST should have done whatever it took, including the removal of FTC/FLL from the dome entirely, to keep all 4 divisions in the dome.

$0.02