Should Chairman's Winners Be Required to Publicly Post Essays?

[Lil' Lavery]

Much of what I say will end up echoing Rich, Kim, and others. In no way am I ashamed of this post "emulating" their very valid points.

Once upon I time, I viewed the Chairman's Award as another form of competition. I cared very much about which teams submitted at which regionals, and how we could "beat" the teams at our event. I was even younger than I am today, and as many young people are, I was both ambitious and foolish.

If you view the Chairman's Award as a competition to be won and lost, you're missing the point of the award. I'm not saying you shouldn't strive to win the award and take pride when you do, but the motivation behind your actions should not simply be the trophy at the end. Likewise, and more importantly, when another team wins the award you shouldn't view it as a defeat. The achievements of someone else does nothing to tarnish what you have accomplished yourself. If you were already proud of your action, why would a piece of plastic change that? Strive to win the award by accomplishing more, not "getting a leg up" on someone else.

I find it highly unlikely that many teams win the award today without significant effots to share what they do with the FIRST community. It's such a fundamental part of what it means to be a role model that I can't really wrap my head around how a team would win without it. The very fundamental concept of the award is to further FIRST's mission by showcasing the best of the best at accomplishing the end goal. How does secrecy help you further the mission of FIRST? How does secrecy make you a good role model to emulate? And, yes, being emulated is the point and a positive result.

I understand the work that goes towards winning a Chairman's Award and preparing the submission. I helped write three Chairman's essays in high school, presented two of them, and have edited and reviewed multiple since then. Both 116 and 1712 have left plenty of events without a Chairman's banner, but with feedback forms loaded with "currently strong" check marks. It took 116 13 years to finally win a RCA. 1712 has yet to reach that goal. It's no easy task, and I fully understand the frustration. But all that work should be a mark of pride, even if your ultimate ambition is unfulfilled. Why on Earth would you keep any aspects of that a secret?

[Meredith Novak]

Originally Posted by Justin Montois

I know Bomb Squad wanted all RCA winners one year to submit their essays for inclusion in 16's HoF display. Not sure if they still do it.

We had a "Future Hall of Fame" display for several years where the current year RCA winners were invited to put whatever they wanted on our computer for people to access with a touch screen. It started long ago enough that a touch screen was interesting. The HoF display constraints that began in 2012 ended it.

Some teams were happy to provide all their material - essay, pictures, video - some didn't want to participate and kept their submission secret. I promised to not reveal any of the submissions until the CMP display. I did enjoy looking over them all myself, but had no judgement toward the teams who wanted to hold their cards, so to speak.

Sorry for the digression, but the FRC16 media group asked me for a "digital copy" of our 2000 CCA winning submission instead of the pieces of paper so that they could post it to our website. My answer, "scan to a PDF," did not make them happy. How far we have come!

My answer to Akash's question: I would not support "making" teams post their submissions. Chairman's teams should want to publicize their efforts, but that doesn't have to be their exact submission. And cheaters never prosper - in the long run anyway.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by Meredith Novak

We had a "Future Hall of Fame" display for several years where the current year RCA winners were invited to put whatever they wanted on our computer for people to access with a touch screen. It started long ago enough that a touch screen was interesting. The HoF display constraints that began in 2012 ended it.

Some teams were happy to provide all their material - essay, pictures, video - some didn't want to participate and kept their submission secret. I promised to not reveal any of the submissions until the CMP display. I did enjoy looking over them all myself, but had no judgement toward the teams who wanted to hold their cards, so to speak.

Sorry for the digression, but the FRC16 media group asked me for a "digital copy" of our 2000 CCA winning submission instead of the pieces of paper so that they could post it to our website. My answer, "scan to a PDF," did not make them happy. How far we have come!

My answer to Akash's question: I would not support "making" teams post their submissions. Chairman's teams should want to publicize their efforts, but that doesn't have to be their exact submission. And cheaters never prosper - in the long run anyway.

I'm still pretty disappointed about this. For all the talk in this thread about the importance of entering for an RCA award and its importance, I wish the display size would be representative of such efforts.

[Rich Kressly]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

... I understand the work that goes towards winning a Chairman's Award and preparing the submission. I helped write three Chairman's essays in high school, presented two of them, and have edited and reviewed multiple since then. Both 116 and 1712 have left plenty of events without a Chairman's banner, but with feedback forms loaded with "currently strong" check marks. It took 116 13 years to finally win a RCA. 1712 has yet to reach that goal. It's no easy task, and I fully understand the frustration. But all that work should be a mark of pride, even if your ultimate ambition is unfulfilled. Why on Earth would you keep any aspects of that a secret?

I really dig Sean's post, especially the part I highlighted above. Kinda reminds me of Karthik Kanabapathy's TEDx talk from this past weekend, "If you chase perfection (which you'll never achieve), you'll catch excellence along the way." What team is he from again?

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

Much of what I say will end up echoing Rich, Kim, and others. In no way am I ashamed of this post "emulating" their very valid points.

Once upon I time, I viewed the Chairman's Award as another form of competition. I cared very much about which teams submitted at which regionals, and how we could "beat" the teams at our event. I was even younger than I am today, and as many young people are, I was both ambitious and foolish.

If you view the Chairman's Award as a competition to be won and lost, you're missing the point of the award. I'm not saying you shouldn't strive to win the award and take pride when you do, but the motivation behind your actions should not simply be the trophy at the end. Likewise, and more importantly, when another team wins the award you shouldn't view it as a defeat. The achievements of someone else does nothing to tarnish what you have accomplished yourself. If you were already proud of your action, why would a piece of plastic change that? Strive to win the award by accomplishing more, not "getting a leg up" on someone else.

I find it highly unlikely that many teams win the award today without significant effots to share what they do with the FIRST community. It's such a fundamental part of what it means to be a role model that I can't really wrap my head around how a team would win without it. The very fundamental concept of the award is to further FIRST's mission by showcasing the best of the best at accomplishing the end goal. How does secrecy help you further the mission of FIRST? How does secrecy make you a good role model to emulate? And, yes, being emulated is the point and a positive result.

I understand the work that goes towards winning a Chairman's Award and preparing the submission. I helped write three Chairman's essays in high school, presented two of them, and have edited and reviewed multiple since then. Both 116 and 1712 have left plenty of events without a Chairman's banner, but with feedback forms loaded with "currently strong" check marks. It took 116 13 years to finally win a RCA. 1712 has yet to reach that goal. It's no easy task, and I fully understand the frustration. But all that work should be a mark of pride, even if your ultimate ambition is unfulfilled. Why on Earth would you keep any aspects of that a secret?

I'll be honest. I dont miss the work the team put forth in the "preparation" of a submission. It truly is a lot of work trying to document everything you do. Every team (some more than others) has great learning moments. But trying to capture it all, makes it tough. Our team has just about every element that we still continue to do regardless of an RCA award or not, minus the submission and pictures.

One big award I am very disappointed about is the elimination of the website award. I'm afraid, less teams will focus on having one.............which I think is the biggest form of communication a team can transparently showcase about themselves.

[Akash Rastogi]

Originally Posted by ebarker

3) the business about passing along false information !! - we have a bunch of rookies in 'boot camp' learning about the team. They looked like a bunch of military recruits with the "deer in the headlights" look. We give exam to all team members, rookie and veteran about team history, Chairman's information, and all the rest. The last thing we want is some clown BS'ing to anyone about what is going on. There is absolutely no good outcome to that scenario. If they don't know the answer they need to pass the question to someone else.

Students have to pass a written and oral exam. The written exam will be given in a month. It looks like this:

I actually really like this concept, as it would solve one of the issues that I think exists. Might have to borrow this for the future!

[karomata]

The point of the Chairman's Video is for the benefit of other teams, so I don't see a reason that posting their essay should be nessesary.

[mathking]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

If you view the Chairman's Award as a competition to be won and lost, you're missing the point of the award. I'm not saying you shouldn't strive to win the award and take pride when you do, but the motivation behind your actions should not simply be the trophy at the end. Likewise, and more importantly, when another team wins the award you shouldn't view it as a defeat. The achievements of someone else does nothing to tarnish what you have accomplished yourself. If you were already proud of your action, why would a piece of plastic change that? Strive to win the award by accomplishing more, not "getting a leg up" on someone else.

This.

I have grown to look at the Chairman's Award in much the same way I look at coaching cross country. Our team has 75 boys and 85 girls. Only two of them ever get to be the fastest even on our team. Some years we have a really good team and not a single runner on the team ever wins a race. In cross country we focus on running well. When an athlete runs a personal best time for a course, or an overall personal best, it is cause of celebration. That is what I now try to instill in the students regarding the Chairman's Award.

A few years ago at the Buckeye Regional, we got our feedback forms back with, as Sean mentioned, lots of currently strong check marks. The judges made note that it was a difficult decision and they simply felt the team that won had been a little bit stronger. As it happened, I had been chatting with one of their (291, CIA) mentors and some parents the day before. While I felt we had a really strong submission that year, I knew that they were deserving of the award. And I realized that it was just like coaching cross country. I am much more satisfied when we run really good races against top competition and don't win than when we win against competition that isn't as talented as we are.

In any event, thank you everyone for this conversation. It has been interesting and thought provoking.

[Tristan Lall]

I'd make them mandatory, and publish them together in one place.

One reason to do so is to seed just a little bit of uncertainty in the mind of anyone who would consider laying claim to an unverified fact (as distinct from a known falsehood) to strengthen their essay. "What if someone notices?" is enforcement enough for me: it's enforced in your head, by your fear of embarrassment, and not just by your conscience. There's definitely no need to give FIRST the responsibility of fact-checking anything.

Another reason I'd make them mandatory is so that they can be treated as some kind of a historical record. Wouldn't it be nice to see, decade by decade, what FIRST teams used to do differently? What was important to them back then?

Originally Posted by Rich Kressly

What team is he from again?

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