Pacific NW District (Official)

[Navid Shafa]

Several weeks ago it was officially announced that FIRST WA and Oregon FIRST will be working together to create a new District system for the 2014 competition season. Tonight at 8pm PDT, there was a webinar about the new district model.


*Note: Everything from the webinar and the notes below are subject to change.

My Webinar Notes:

-Moving to the district system will reduce costs for the teams and reduce the professional overhead.
-It will also increase playing time for the teams and improve the quality of the FIRST experience for all teams.
-FIRST HQ has asked both the PNW and NE FIRST to move to districts for the 2014 year
-The district system has invited, but not mandated that teams in Idaho and Montana join (currently a total of 21 teams).
-USFIRST’s goal is for the entire country to be in a district model by 2017, we’d like to be one of the leaders, along with FiM and MAR.
-The PNW Championship is likely to be a week 7 event (April 9-12, 2014), hosted at the Rose Coliseum (Current home of the Autodesk Oregon Regional).
-World champs: (April 23-26, 2014)
-Washington and Oregon had 156 active teams in 2013 and is projecting growth to 185-200 teams in the 2014 season.
-There is likely to be 10-12 district events (depending on size). The current projection is 10 districts, 2 each week.
-The tentative location breakdown: 5 in the Puget Sound, 1 in Central Washington, 1 in Spokane, 3 in Portland.
-Each event will host 32-40 teams.
-Districts will have similar Friday and Saturday schedules to a regional, but Thursday will be different. Thursday will be from 5pm-10pm. Inspections and 1-2 practice matches will occur.
-Teams will get 6 hours of unbag time during each week they will be competing (similar to FiM and MAR).
-Approximately 120 volunteers will be needed per event, please sign up!
-The District Committee has already visited 7-8 possible schools to be used as venues.
-Cost Breakdown: $5,000 per two District entries ($6,500 for rookies), $4,000 for State Champs, and $1,000 for a third district event (will not count towards ranking points, like FiM)
-State Champs will invite the top 64 teams based on the PNW ranking system, USFIRST will have an idea of the National Standardized Point Model by the end of July. This is likely to take the best from the FiM, MAR, NE FIRST and PNW ranking systems.
-PNW has not disclosed the point system yet, but has noted that awards are likely to be at least as important as they are in FiM and Mar.
-Chairman’s awards will be judged at districts. The district winners will then present again at State Champs, and 3 Chairman Winners will qualify for Worlds.
-PNW is debating a point reset for State Champs, unlike FiM.
-If the venues are smaller, teams may be expected to reduce pit sizes to 8’x8’ (rather than the standard 10’x10’).
-Volunteer, Volunteer, Volunteer!