Ohio going to Districts?

[Donut]

Originally Posted by Foster

I like the concept of "here is a district, if there is one nearer to you, opt into that one".

This to me is the simplest solution for assigning districts. If we're not going to allow teams to pick what District they are part of then it should be determined by the closest event, and while we still have the regional/district divide then the closest event determines if you are in a district at all. FiM already exists which may require some grandfathering, but I don't want to see teams cut off from close events due to artificial district boundaries like state lines.

The first two years I was with 167 our closest event would have been the Midwest regional at 220 miles away. Last year with the addition of Central Illinois that is now the closest event at 150 miles. If that event goes to districts I would want to see the team included in that district. If the district was based on artificial state lines, say the Illinois/Wisconsin district to take advantage of the population density in the Chicago & Milwaukee area, then we would lose our 3 closest events. Putting Iowa into a district with Minnesota isn't much of a consolation as currently the closest event is 300 miles for more southern teams.

A geography based mapping could lead to some oddities like a team changing districts as new events are added, but I'll take that over being outright barred from nearby events. It also poses an interesting question; when there are no more regionals and Missouri, Illinois, and Minnesota have all gone to separate districts, how do you determine which one a new event in Des Moines joins?

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

Instead of "regional venue" I should have said "regional location". You don't run away from the volunteers, sponsors, and especially the teams who are concentrated in those larger urban centers. You can have the events at whatever venue you can afford within the metro area of interest.

And if you want to establish other district competitions in more podunk locations, more power to ye.

Creating small groups of people dedicated to ensuring that your area has enough volunteers, sponsors, and a plan for future growth BEFORE jumping to the district model will help with this.

Hopefully your dedicated volunteers will follow the event, and if the district has enough money (because they have an organized sponsorship base) they can potentially pay for their key volunteers to travel if needed. InF is not doing that this year, but we're a small district, and travel is limited.

I'd love to see Ohio go to districts next year. We might be able to have some Ohio/InF crossover play!

[RonnieS]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

It's not exactly team locations (I can give you a map of Texas w/ 2014 teams and 2015 events plotted later if you want) but I did map all travel for 2014 that might be semi relevant: http://schreiaj.github.io/frc-travel-map/

Is this in miles? I believe your data is wrong...at least for our team it is. Unless it only is counting 2 events but says 3??
-Ronnie

[mathking]

I think Ohio is probably close to being ready if you include Western PA and WV. The Ohio State Championship is in its third year this year and as I understand it will be at the same venue. The CORI invitational will be in its 6th year this June. The second Mahoning Valley Robotics challenge will be held this fall (Travis I think this year we will be able to make it. My coaching cross-country made it hard but we are putting the plans in place well ahead of time now.) MAR hosted their 24 hour event with WVU this summer. So that is four competitions to go along with the three regional events already in the area.

We have been fortunate enough to qualify for the World Championships in half of our seasons to date. But it is getting harder. I like the idea of having something more realistic (and less reliant on the luck of the draw at a single event) to shoot for as a team in terms of qualifying on. Even if it makes getting to the World Championships less likely, I think the chance to qualify for a District Championship could be a big motivator.

[matthewdenny]

So likely Ohio/etc venues seem to be :
Cleveland
Cinnci
Machining Valley
Columbus x2
Pittsburgh
?

Would there likely be one in WV?

[Jimmy Nichols]

We would hate to speculate as there are a lot of factors to consider for the switch to districts. The big hurdle we have is getting enough key volunteers trained in the area of interest as well as getting the funding to support all of the events. When we have firm plans we will be sharing them with the teams in Ohio via email and expect leadership in the other areas to convey the details to their teams. I'm not sure about Buckeye but QCR will be having an OhioFIRST meeting for mentors.

As far as your list goes there is only one event in Columbus, the State Championship is in Dayton this year, same location as last year.

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by matthewdenny

So likely Ohio/etc venues seem to be :
Cleveland
Cinnci
Machining Valley
Columbus x2
Pittsburgh
?

Would there likely be one in WV?

One in WV would be nice. And it is doable. We held our 24-hour off-season last year, among many many other reasons so that we could prepare for the eventuality if hosting a district competition. And there are several venues here in Morgantown and elsewhere that would do it, including where we held our off-season.

This is honestly the biggest reason I want WV to be included eventually. We can't support a regional, but in order to get FRC going stronger, an event will help pull people in and get them interested. And it seems to me like an event in north-central WV will make sense to the Pittsburgh teams.

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

From what I heard almost all of FIRST will be going District by 2017 (there will be obvious exceptions like the Iowa/Nebraska/ Wyoming/North Dakota/ South Dakota areas where there area not enough teams and too much distance to make districts feasible).

My guess is that they will join a nearby district, or even form their own. FRC is a hard enough sell in really rural areas, and telling them that they have to pay twice as much to travel twice as far as every other team in FIRST would just kill it. Having some areas in districts and some not is just not a sustainable model. Even if that means they have to travel for six hours or more to get to a district event, I'm sure they'd rather do it than spend thousands of more dollars for much much less playing time.

Having these areas in neighboring districts will actually make it easier to start more teams anyway, ensuring that they can have their own district in the future.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

FRC is a hard enough sell in really rural areas, and telling them that they have to pay twice as much to travel twice as far as every other team in FIRST would just kill it.

I don't understand. Who would be asked to pay twice as much, and why?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

I don't understand. Who would be asked to pay twice as much, and why?

Not in registration, nope. In travel. If teams have to travel extra distance to get to an event they can attend, just because all the nearby events are districts, they've got to either pay the money (read: raise extra money, possibly twice as much depending on distance) or join a district where you'll at least get double the mileage out of that money.

E.g.: A team in SD currently attends Colorado Regional. Colorado, Utah, Montana, and Idaho decide to combine forces for one district system. Simultaneously, MN goes district. Now, the nearest regional is Kansas City... unless, as floated a couple years ago, that area goes district, when it's Vegas, one of the Arizona events, or somewhere farther afield. Basically, when every regional is a 2-day drive, the cost of attendance just doubled (hotel, gas...).

So, the nice thing to do would be for the CO/UT/MN/ID district system to invite the SD teams (at least in certain areas) to join in, so that those 2x attendance costs at least go to 2x events.

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

I don't understand. Who would be asked to pay twice as much, and why?

Districts are cheaper than regionals. Correct me if I'm wrong, but district event registration gets you 2 events and it is still cheaper/se cost as just one regional. If areas are left out of districts, this creates an unfair disadvantage to those left out. Then you add travel time, as EricH said above. I always use the example of WV. If everyone around us goes districts, and leaves us out, where are we going to go? Oh yeah, WV only has 4 teams, they can't support districts! Well we also can't support traveling to Montana paying the ridiculous regional registration fees AND all the travel costs only to get much fewer matches than the other teams ( scenario assuming 90% district saturation).

So include these teams in adjoining districts. I'm sure they'd rather travel the extra hours so they can get the more playing time and cost benefits that districts bring. This is why districts WILL be everywhere. If not, we are going to further alienate our rural teams and make it even harder to get new teams in these areas started up.

I.e. Giving a cost break and allowing more playing time for your money only to teams in FIRST-saturated/urban areas is an unsustainable model. Even if it means a team needs to travel for 6 hours or more to get to a district event, they should do it instead of being stuck with only one big expensive event 10 hours away.

[Bob Ward]

In the mean time, I saw a while back that Michigan or Indiana was thinking about letting non-resident teams into their District events.

Has that happened yet?

[tindleroot]

Originally Posted by Bob Ward

In the mean time, I saw a while back that Michigan or Indiana was thinking about letting non-resident teams into their District events.

Has that happened yet?

By definition FIRST is not allowing non-district teams to compete at district events. However, during the 2015 season they allowed teams in most districts to register for events in different districts (with some logistical changes). In Indiana, this happened with team 2474 in Indy and teams 68 and 107 at Kokomo. Michigan, Indiana, and by extension other districts do not have the power to decide whether or not they let regional teams in - that decision is up to FIRST HQ.

[logank013]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

Districts are cheaper than regionals. Correct me if I'm wrong, but district event registration gets you 2 events and it is still cheaper/se cost as just one regional.

Pretty true. I'm pretty sure how it worked in Indiana was that it was $5,000 for the 2 events. The third event was $1,000 extra. And the DCMPS was $4,000. And like others were saying, I really feel like we sent the best robots in Indiana. Even the RAS, EI, CA were really good robots.