[FRC Blog] Frank Answers Fridays: June 7, 2013

[PayneTrain]

People forget that the growth in Minnesota is a result of having a series of programs available for schools and organizations to start teams and keep them relatively sustainable, but the teams themselves across the entire state are rather inexperienced in comparison to the entirety of FRC, much less the two areas that currently support a district. The teams and the representatives that came together to support the districts in Michigan and NJ/PA/DE represent some of the "old guard" of FIRST as a whole.

Minnesota reached 180 teams 7 years after the foundation of their first team. Michigan reached 180 teams 16 years after the foundation of their first team.

It isn't as easy as this community thinks, myself occasionally included, to pick a series of boundaries with a certain number of teams within it and at a certain team density, and declare as armchair directors "You there! Build a district system!" The entire Minnesota program has existed exclusively in the modern 3v3 era. Imagine that! The state also exists almost entirely as an FRC island: there isn't the massive interstate cooperation and competition that exists on pockets of both coasts of the states or between the provinces of Canada.

Minnesota is a relatively dense location and is representative of the success teams can generate to support more teams, but a lot of teams in the state, in addition to the organization as a whole is like bread that hasn't fully risen yet. The ingredients are already in place and the environment is right, but it takes time and care.

I find it surprising the PNW area is jumping on so quickly because of the regions relative novelty as a fully developed area of competition. That will be an area to watch not only for its oft-unnoticed teams, but for their bold push to the new competitive structure.