District Feasibility/Potential

[Ivan Malik]

Payne you kind of touched on something that most people don't realize about districts: Volunteers in key roles are what is needed most. Your FTA's, Head Refs, Field supervisors, etc. are what is really the limiting factor to do districts. Here in Michigan these folks are not just doing one, two or even three events; they are at an event every single week of competition season, maybe having one week off... If nothing goes wrong. The worst part about this "glitch" is that training a key role volunteer takes time and effort. They are not the types of positions that can be filled by just anyone. These almost have to be seasoned FIRSTers that are groomed over a few seasons for the positions. There is a group of I'm going to guess and say 20 or so folks (don't quote me, its an estimate) that travel the state of Michigan and are volunteering almost every single week in some regard or another, often key positions. Michigan's district system is only possible because these folks effectively put their lives on hold for 7 weeks, on top of supporting their own teams. You can fill positions like field reset and queuing with random students and parents, but if you think that you can fill even one "key position" with them then your event will grind to a halt before it even starts.

Also when you guys throw out numbers on team density for Michigan, you might as well lop off the UP. (I hate to say this because I go to school up there) The UP pretty much breaks the district model, it is just to far for to few teams to travel and be worth it. If you are looking for an example of what to do, don't base it off something that is broken, you basically are shooting yourself in the foot before a marathon.