Confirmed New Districts for 2015?

[bam-bam]

I've heard rumblings that an Indiana-Illinois district system was confirmed, which was why so many Indiana teams flew out to distant regionals this year. I'm about 80% certain of this, but could someone with more knowledge confirm?

[JYang]

Originally Posted by VioletElizabeth

Can students be volunteers? Just as a general question--I remember doing field reset somewhere (it may have been offseason) as an unofficial job, because they were short on people.

There are positions students can do, such as field reset, safety glasses handing out etc. However, positions like MC, GA, Judging, Ref, Inspectors, they cannot.

California regionals already suffer from not having enough volunteers. I am extremely worried about even more burn out if California goes districts.

[m1506m]

Michigan's CMP is free for teams I hear, but it could wrong.

Not free. Absolutely not free.

[DampRobot]

Originally Posted by m1506m

Michigan's CMP is free for teams I hear, but it could wrong.

Not free. Absolutely not free.

The story I heard is that the MSC people wanted to make it free, as it would be supported by sponsors, etc, but FIRST makes them charge the registration fee.

[Zebra_Fact_Man]

Originally Posted by DonRotolo

Of course, you can require teams to provide X volunteers.

Every MI team is "required" to provide 2 volunteers per year (not much of a requirement / more like a strong suggestion, but many provide more than two anyway, and alot of people are repeat offenders).

Originally Posted by Brandon_L

Michigan's CMP is free for teams I hear, but it could be wrong.

Word on the street is that the MSC could have been free (and FiM wanted it to be free), but Headquarters in NH required the the additional event fee to participate at the State Championship. FiM also wanted outside teams to be able to participate in disctrict events, but again Headquarters said no.

There's some paper posted here on CD about how districts came into fruition and why they work the way they do, but I'm much too lazy to go looking for it.

Originally Posted by VioletElizabeth

Can students be volunteers? Just as a general question--I remember doing field reset somewhere (it may have been offseason) as an unofficial job, because they were short on people.

Absolutely! There are MANY jobs that students can do at each event.

[Gregor]

Originally Posted by JYang

There are positions students can do, such as field reset, safety glasses handing out etc. However, positions like MC, GA, Judging, Ref, Inspectors, they cannot.

Under none of those positions can I find an age requirement.

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...es-%28emcee%29

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...game-announcer

http://www.usfirst.org/community/volunteers/judge

http://www.usfirst.org/community/volunteers/referee

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...obot-inspector

Now in practice most of these roles are filled by adults, but that's not always the case*.


*source, I'm a referee.

[JYang]

Originally Posted by Gregor

Under none of those positions can I find an age requirement.

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...es-%28emcee%29

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...game-announcer

http://www.usfirst.org/community/volunteers/judge

http://www.usfirst.org/community/volunteers/referee

http://www.usfirst.org/community/vol...obot-inspector

Now in practice most of these roles are filled by adults, but that's not always the case*.


*source, I'm a referee.

Oh huhhh.... there was a page/document a while ago that said MC's are not allowed to be students (graduate students included).... now I have no clue where that page went ><

My bad then!

[MrTechCenter]

Originally Posted by JYang

There are positions students can do, such as field reset, safety glasses handing out etc. However, positions like MC, GA, Judging, Ref, Inspectors, they cannot.

California regionals already suffer from not having enough volunteers. I am extremely worried about even more burn out if California goes districts.

When we did our offseason competition, we had our school's Key Club partner with us because they are a huge community service organization. We offered community service hours (which are a graduation requirement at our school) for those who volunteered at the event, and just like that we had an army of student volunteers, leaving all of the adults to do the more complex jobs. Some teams that attended had extra students that weren't doing anything, so they volunteered as well, allowing us to create shifts.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by bam-bam

I've heard rumblings that an Indiana-Illinois district system was confirmed, which was why so many Indiana teams flew out to distant regionals this year. I'm about 80% certain of this, but could someone with more knowledge confirm?

I haven't heard anything about them but I'm ready for them.

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by DampRobot

The story I heard is that the MSC people wanted to make it free, as it would be supported by sponsors, etc, but FIRST makes them charge the registration fee.

Yes FiM wanted to make their DCMP free because the funds to run the event are derived from sponsors, just like all Regionals. However the current funding system for FIRST depends on those "second" play registration fees, which all goes to FIRST, to keep them in the black. Now they could do like MAR has done and provide grants to teams that qualify for DCMP but don't have the funding to attend. That is something that some of us in the PNW District have discussed working toward in the future.

[Whippet]

I'm ready for Texas to make the switch. We currently can't afford two regionals, and a switch to the district system will make a lot of rings more convenient for us.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

VA, DC, and MD will not be going to the district model next year. Hopefully 2016 though.

There's a saying that every time you bring up switching systems in Virginia it gets pushed back a year.

[Oblarg]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

There's a saying that every time you bring up switching systems in Virginia it gets pushed back a year.

Honestly, the MD area isn't ready at all for the switch (well, outside of Baltimore, at least - I've got no idea how ready the teams over there are). We need a lot more networking between the teams here if we're going to handle the logistics of going to districts cleanly. I think even 2016 is a bit optimistic, tbh.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Oblarg

Honestly, the MD area isn't ready at all for the switch (well, outside of Baltimore, at least - I've got no idea how ready the teams over there are). We need a lot more networking between the teams here if we're going to handle the logistics of going to districts cleanly. I think even 2016 is a bit optimistic, tbh.

Don't worry; between all of the mentions in this thread I think we've pushed it back to 2019.

Originally Posted by JYang

Oh huhhh.... there was a page/document a while ago that said MC's are not allowed to be students (graduate students included).... now I have no clue where that page went ><

My bad then!

You sure? I was offered a position as MC a state where I was considering going to college because I knew the people out there (exact place will not be named publicly since I've decided not to go there).