A Request

[Koko Ed]

I'll be blunt and straight to the point. I do not care for FTC and I have no interest in FTC.
My main issue is the inconsistent lack of information about events and teams. FRC is excellent about having information about FRC teams and event. Any information I want is easily accessible. Results. Awards. History. It's all there. Any time I try to look up information on FTC I cannot find it or it's minimal. They have gotten better at it but nearly the level I expect from an organization like FIRST. In my opinion FTC is a lesser event. It is nowhere near as well organized as FRC and until things change I will not dedicate a moment of interest towards it.

[Tungrus]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

..... In my opinion FTC is a lesser event. It is nowhere near as well organized as FRC and until things change I will not dedicate a moment of interest towards it.

????

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Tungrus

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I was lead que at the Hudson Valley FTC event. It was a cute little event but honestly it felt more like a start up FRC off season event than an official FIRST qualifier. I was expecting more.

[maths222]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

I'll be blunt and straight to the point. I do not care for FTC and I have no interest in FTC.
My main issue is the inconsistent lack of information about events and teams. FRC is excellent about having information about FRC teams and event. Any information I want is easily accessible. Results. Awards. History. It's all there. Any time I try to look up information on FTC I cannot find it or it's minimal. They have gotten better at it but nearly the level I expect from an organization like FIRST. In my opinion FTC is a lesser event. It is nowhere near as well organized as FRC and until things change I will not dedicate a moment of interest towards it.

I'm trying to understand why the lack of information on team history makes FTC inferior. Events are actually listed fairly accurately on the FIRST website. One of the main reasons that it is harder to find the information is because FTC events are not on the scale of an FRC regional; instead, there are more events, each with its own organizers and flavor. As a result of the smaller scope of each event, FIRST is less directly involved in each one, and it is up to the event organizers, in large part, to ensure that team performance information is preserved. The events are actually orgainzed, in general, very well by the tournament organizers; the main difference with FRC is that organizing events does not begin at the top in Manchester. This year, a move towards making this information accessible has begun with TheYellowAlliance.net, which should grow in the coming years. [/RANT]

Disclaimer: I am a proud FTC participant who has traveled to the World Championships for 4 years; however, I am also very familiar with FRC through ChiefDelphi.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by maths222

I'm trying to understand why the lack of information on team history makes FTC inferior. Events are actually listed fairly accurately on the FIRST website. One of the main reasons that it is harder to find the information is because FTC events are not on the scale of an FRC regional; instead, there are more events, each with its own organizers and flavor. As a result of the smaller scope of each event, FIRST is less directly involved in each one, and it is up to the event organizers, in large part, to ensure that team performance information is preserved. The events are actually orgainzed, in general, very well by the tournament organizers; the main difference with FRC is that organizing events does not begin at the top in Manchester. This year, a move towards making this information accessible has begun with TheYellowAlliance.net, which should grow in the coming years. [/RANT]

Disclaimer: I am a proud FTC participant who has traveled to the World Championships for 4 years; however, I am also very familiar with FRC through ChiefDelphi.

Information about the event and teams is important to the public perception of the program. FRC is very thorough with information about statistics at the event. Match results. Information about how much the teams have scored and how they scored it and links to teams websites. I ave found no such thing for FTC or their teams. If you can't be forthcoming about who you guys are and what you do why should I care? I need more than some impassioned plea on a messageboard.

[JeremyLansing]

I suppose I would be one of those people you are asking to stop looking down on FTC, so I feel like I should explain why I do. I would not say FTC is necessarily inferior to FRC, it does have its strengths. FTC teams are far cheaper for a high school to fund, and make it much more feasible for FIRST to reach its goal of a FIRST team in every school. Coming from a high school in Iowa, almost every 4A school in our area had at least 1 FTC team, while Iowa still only has 6 FRC teams in the entire state.

That being said however, FTC is not as exciting, from an outsiders perspective, as FRC. I know that for those of you who compete, its extremely exciting, but even up close, the robots are just slower, the field is smaller, and once you get to the Edward Jones dome, and people look down on this tiny field you can hardly see, they will start to wonder about that huge field over there where everyone is cheering.

If our goal is to inspire broader acceptance and interest in STEM beyond people in FIRST, if we want a FIRST event on national TV, it will be an FRC event, because FRC is and will be for the foreseeable future, the flagship FIRST program. I'm not saying you can't learn a lot doing FTC, I'm not saying you can't be an amazing engineer after being on an FTC team, but if we want to hook people outside FIRST, we will do it with FRC, not FTC. Thats why I see it as "FRC-Lite".

[Christopher149]

Originally Posted by JeremyLansing

Coming from a high school in Iowa, almost every 4A school in our area had at least 1 FTC team, while Iowa still only has 6 FRC teams in the entire state.

To muddle the topic, the UP of Michigan (1/3 the population density and 1/10 total population of Iowa) has 1* Vex team, 0 FTC teams, and 18 FRC teams.

*There is one in Iron Mountain, but I'm not sure and don't know where to find if there are any others.

[CENTURION]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

Information about the event and teams is important to the public perception of the program. FRC is very thorough with information about statistics at the event. Match results. Information about how much the teams have scored and how they scored it and links to teams websites. I ave found no such thing for FTC or their teams. If you can't be forthcoming about who you guys are and what you do why should I care? I need more than some impassioned plea on a messageboard.

Remember that The Blue Allicance is a third-party, not an official part of the FRC program. And FTC is getting better at this with the newly-created Yellow Alliance.

I think you'll find that FTC teams are very "forthcoming" about who they are and what they do, just as any FRC team would be. But FTC competitions are just generally less of a spectator sport (At least for now). Why does everything have to be defined by how accessible the match results are? I don't see the letters "MR" anywhere in "FIRST"

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by CENTURION

I don't see the letters "MR" anywhere in "FIRST"

Nor will you find the letter "C", but that's half of what defines both FRC and FTC.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

In my opinion FTC is a lesser event.

I'll second this. And further, I'll expand it to VEX.

It is the JV to the FRC Varsity. It is slower, less exciting, less of a spectacle. From my perspective it is an excellent tool to use to feed students into the Varsity program which we can use to actually change the culture.

And, before someone says I am unfamiliar with the programs:

2 years FVC mentor, 2 years FTC mentor, 7 years FRC mentor.

[FTC7584]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

I'll second this. And further, I'll expand it to VEX.

It is the JV to the FRC Varsity. It is slower, less exciting, less of a spectacle. From my perspective it is an excellent tool to use to feed students into the Varsity program which we can use to actually change the culture.

I think saying that exclusively FRC students, and not FTC students, are going to end up being good engineers and culture changers would be an huge misstatement.

You have to take into account that FTC might actually be helping more then FRC, because FTC can reach way more schools and teams, due to its much lower cost. FTC teams might not be as impressive to an outsider as a FRC team, but FTC helps pull in more students into the ideas of engineering because of that much wider reach.

I personally attend a school where we just can't afford a FRC team because of all the costs that go with it, so we have FTC, and we still get all the lessons we would of gotten from FRC.

Sure, FRC robots are huge compared to FTC robots, however, if FTC outdoes FRC in anything, its competitiveness. Unlike FRC where you see 'regulars', who almost always make it to the world championships, in FTC, due to the amount of teams, it's extremely hard to make it to worlds for one year, let alone several years in a row.

I didn't know elitism was an issue in FIRST, and its definitely surprising to find, as the whole centerpiece of FIRST is gracious professionalism.

[JohnFogarty]

Originally Posted by FTC7584

I didn't know elitism was an issue in FIRST, and its definitely surprising to find, as the whole centerpiece of FIRST is gracious professionalism.

It's something that I don't really see much outside of good ole' Chief Delphi. Publicly anyway.

[StillDefective]

Originally Posted by Various People

Can you count?

I guess I am just missing something, we explored for a while, but not for THAT long.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by FTC7584

I think saying that exclusively FRC students, and not FTC students, are going to end up being good engineers and culture changers would be an huge misstatement.

You have to take into account that FTC might actually be helping more then FRC, because FTC can reach way more schools and teams, due to its much lower cost. FTC teams might not be as impressive to an outsider as a FRC team, but FTC helps pull in more students into the ideas of engineering because of that much wider reach.

Where on earth did I say that? You're mistaking the micro goals of FIRST (inspiring students) with the macro goals of FIRST (cultural change). FRC is better at the macro goal. I did not say anything about the micro goal.

[FTC7584]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Where on earth did I say that? You're mistaking the micro goals of FIRST (inspiring students) with the macro goals of FIRST (cultural change). FRC is better at the macro goal. I did not say anything about the micro goal.

You said -

It is the JV to the FRC Varsity. It is slower, less exciting, less of a spectacle. From my perspective it is an excellent tool to use to feed students into the Varsity program which we can use to actually change the culture.

The way I read it, it seemed to me that you thought FTC wasn't able to help change the culture, something FRC could.

I think it isn't the job of one competition level of FIRST to change the culture, but rather all of FIRST as an organization. That'd be like saying that only doctors with a PhD. have the job of helping people overcome sickness.