FRC Blogged - Frank Answers Fridays: October 4, 2013

[Allison K]

Originally Posted by Taylor

Allison - I think what he's suggesting is the VEX competition still be year-round, just having the championship in November/December instead of April. The number of events would remain unchanged, they'd just be shifted by five months. No loss in design, construction, or competition time.
I would prefer this type of calendar - our team uses VEX to 'set the hook' with our incoming rookies. They design and build robots to play the VRC game in the fall, then those robots lay dormant the next three months while FRC season goes on. If the championship was to be in late November/early December, then both robotics' seasons would make much more sense to the students.

That would be an interesting shift.

With my limited outsider understanding it seems like VEX has two primary populations, each with two sub-populations.

• 1a) FRC teams that use VRC as a primer program to prepare students for FRC
• 1b) FRC teams that use VRC as an overflow program to reduce numbers on the FRC team/expand their target market/appeal to students who aren't enticed by the breakneck FRC pace
• 2a) Schools with VRC integrated as a part of their curriculum
• 2b) Schools with VRC as an extracurricular activity, but not part of the curriculum

I'm not sure the relative proportions of those populations within the VRC community, but I wonder if 2a/2b are significantly more represented that 1a/1b? I think for schools (at least those based in North America) shifting the season would be an unpopular change ("unpopular" is probably an understatement), especially for the 2a teams where students enrolled in the course one year probably aren't the following year.