Future First Championship News

[Anupam Goli]

Originally Posted by jman4747

What they are saying is they favor winning over the technical chalenge in FRC. Good riddance. I'll stick with the big robots.

Doing what it takes to win is the technical challenge for many of us. The bar is raised every year thanks to these teams. I'll stick to the competition where they go, because in the process of trying to win, we'll be in a "technical challenge" of our own and we'll end up learning a lot on the way.

[jman4747]

Originally Posted by Anupam Goli

Doing what it takes to win is the technical challenge for many of us. The bar is raised every year thanks to these teams. I'll stick to the competition where they go, because in the process of trying to win, we'll be in a "technical challenge" of our own and we'll end up learning a lot on the way.

This seems to suggest that half of the world is not very competative. It also assumes no one will rise to the challenge presented by who is at the top of the region and that no new powerhouses will ever spring up. And when I say technical I mean the engineering of the robot. Winning is a function of that, driver training, scouting, strategy, co-op, luck, etc. I'm not following someone because they can't have their undisputed winner belt.

[RonAyyyyyyyy]

just curious, what is a "flex event" as stated on the "First's Vision" link?

Also, I am not a fan of this change at all either. I like the super regional idea a lot more.

[AndrewPospeshil]

Whew, so I just read through 38 pages of angry FIRSTers. Something I would never agree to before today. I'll keep my input regarding the implications of this decision to myself seeing as I've hardly known the news for 12 hours now. I ask only a few questions (I apologize in advance for the length of this rambling post - it's 12:30 am and I'm avoiding much needed sleep rn ):

1. Why would FIRST announce this plan at this time? The morning of the first day of 3 DCMPs? It seems like possibly the worst time to do so. 2015 CMP is looming on the horizon - FIRST is probably busy organizing that, working out issues with teams who need help, etc. It seems like the logical time would either be a) at CMP 2015, where all the organizing and planning has been done, and the season is just days from ending or b) in the offseason, when FIRST is relatively dormant and can handle such a large community reaction (which I'm sure they saw coming with such a relatively vague announcement)
2. Speaking of vagueness, why would FIRST announce this plan with a seemingly small amount of information fleshed out? They've determined the broad scope of the event, but a lot of the finer details haven't been revealed/worked out. Now granted they might be looking for some community input before determining things like 2 Champion alliances, 2 WCAs, etc, but I feel like FIRST is pretty good at gauging what's good for the community without it's input (Aerial Assist, district model). I feel like they've revealed only the least appealing information - although that may be intentional, ripping off the metaphorical bandaid)
3. I only suggest CD members (and people not associated with the decision making process in general) to consider what you post in this thread - As a student it is by no means my job, duty, or responsibility to police what others say and post, but it appears some people are allowing their emotions to get ahead of themselves. We've known about this news for less time than some of us will spend building during one day of build season; let's cool it a little. I've seen posts in this thread talking about leaving FIRST altogether, starting revolts or petitions, etc. While I don't necessarily think those ideas are super far-fetched and out of the question (okay, maybe a little ), I think we should wait until the changes are a) in the much nearer future and b) described in much more detail before jumping ship. FIRST has existed successfully for close to 30 years now - I hardly think they would make a decision so horrible that they start to lose all their members!

TL;DR: chill yo

(standard disclaimer about how this post expresses my personal views and my views only, not those of my team, school, city, etc etc)

[Kevin Pardus]

Over the past several hours, with numerous breaks, I have read over at last count 566 posts on 38 pages. So this post most likely will be covered over quickly as more folks continue to respond to this thread.
Missing from those pervious posts are any comments reference what the future impact might be on the current FRC timeline of a Kickoff in early Jan with a 6-1/2 week Build Season followed by a 7 week Regional-District Competition Season. In 2017, using the current FRC timeline, it seems that teams participating in any Week 7 events will only have a few days between the end of those events and the start of the ‘Houston’ FIRST Championship. I am waiting for the other shoe to drop reference the following issues:
1) What will be the effects of the scheduled/contracted 2017-20 FIRST Championship dates on future Kickoff dates and associated Build & Competition Seasons?
2a) Which District Championships & Regional events will feed into which FIRST Championship?
2b) Will those competition events and FIRST Championship alignments change every year or be some what consistent?

[ratdude747]

9LONG post ahead, but I have something to say)

My personal opinion, based on current information: (sarcasm in italics)



Yup. That's what came to mind, for those who won. Yeah, you won. Won what? Doesn't matter, you won. Good Job This trophy feels cheap and looks familiar (sees a bunch of other teams with similar trophies)... Doesn't matter, you won

The way I see it is that FIRST seems to be looking to lower the bar rather than raise the floor. Champs is a big fun party... but it's champs. Where the best of the best are recolonized and more importantly, the model teams for others to emulate, follow, and gain inspiration from.

Sure, good teams will still be good teams either way, but awards are about giving credit where credit is due. It's the reason why when one wins, they are the ones that get the winner's trophy. This is why I think splitting champs w/o some sort of a true final is a HUGE mistake. Sure, there will always be IRI, but IRI isn't meant to be such and making it such (even defacto) would make it something other than IRI.

Some other issues I see (which have been mentioned before):

-southeastern teams and the west coast get the wrong end of the stick, travel is a lose-lose for them. No improvement, but given the relative size of such, one can't claim "improved travel" and still have a straight face without an asterisk.

-Due to a potential competitive level difference between locked regions, one would in time become a step-sibling to the other. This would be bad news for a lot of teams, as it would turn into what NASCAR has with the sprint cup (the elites, mostly) and the Xfinity series (less than elites with a bunch of elites who "steal" wins half the time). While this comparisons seems a bit odd, hear me out; The drivers who "steal" the Xfinity wins would be the elite teams forced into the lesser championship, where they would presumably win a disproportionate amount of the time, leading to such sentiment. The difference being that NASCAR knows well that one is the elite league and one is the lackey league, and that said drivers actively choose to race in the lower league (in addition to Sprint).

---------

Since I want this post to be ultimately constructive, Here's my personal advice for what to do (idealy in some ways):

-Recognize that in order to be a sport in the sense that other HS sports are seen and understood, there has to be a true championship attitude at all events (in that there will be true winners), and structure events to reflect that. Even if there is NO world championship (highest level is region), at least recognize those who excel (and not just say "you'all win, come back next time")

-Move as many areas as possible to districts, with district championships

-(sorta unrelated) make invitation to championship merit based, not quota or waitlist based. Even the current notion of "you have 1/60 of all teams so you shall send 10 teams out of 600 attending" feels and from what I've personally seen in IN, is another place where the flawed logic of "everybody wins" in that invitation to championship is treated as given not earned. (I still think wild cards, HOF, past champions and legacies should get in, they did earn it as none are cakewalks to perform).

-If championship needs to be capped at 400 or 600, so be it. Make the lower events (DSC's) better and greater in quantity, and make championship something that is worth working for and earning.

Finally, I'll give an example that could have merit to follow: Toastmasters International (My dad is very involved with them). They have a large number of clubs (analogous to teams in FRC), and use a tiered system in the following taxonomy (used for the international speech contest each year) : area, division, district, region (former, retired), and world conference. Present FRC districts are about the size (kinda smaller actually) of districts in TI... they used to have a region level that would say be 1/2 or 1/3 of the US (going off memory) which was since rolled up into an expanded world conference. In this case, since most attending are individuals, not whole clubs, the roll up made sense... but before, the region level did work and was sustainable.

On a side not, they also have redistricted clubs where they use a different system to compete (taped speeches) due to the long distances between said clubs (they're typically in remote locations).

Another similarity: they're about improving peoples leadership and public speaking skills, not just winning contests. However, clubs generally do give out awards each meeting for best speaker and best table topics (impromptu speaking), of which about 3 members will perform each meeting. This competitive yet supportive atmosphere is in many ways similar to what FIRST is like to me.

The point here is that there are systems that do work, and allow for a competitive yet supportive organization, and do not require axing one to gain the other.

[lscime]

Oh man, I haven't actually posted in a long time. Also wow, did I really just manage to put off an entire night's-worth of work to read all of this thread?

Okay, so let me begin by saying the following:
1) I'm not a big fan of the new Championship format for reasons that have have already been mentioned in this thread.
2) FIRST HQ could probably handled this better, particularly in the department of asking for community input prior to (presumably) signing contracts.
3) The data do not lend themselves to the assertion that this move will significantly decrease travel expenses for the overwhelming majority of Championship-attending teams.

But for the love of all that is beautifully powder coated and covered by anti-gravity circles, this is not the start of the apocalypse; we all know that the Mayan calendar ends in 2012, not 2017:
4) We don't know all of the information, that fact is both explicitly and implicitly stated by FIRST. The unknown information could be bad (e.g. all teams will now be required to build bumpers in not two, but three different colors ), or it could be fantastic (e.g. all teams will now receive corndogs in their KoPs).
5) Please stop with the "FIRST is clearly doing this for the money just to line their own pockets [paraphrased]." Seriously? That is above and beyond pure, unsubstantiated speculation and does nothing but unnecessarily inflame the situation.
6) This change is not equivalent to everyone getting participation trophies. Heck, the number of awards (save the big ones) given out at Championship increased by a factor of four last year and the general consensus seemed fairly positive. But now an increase of a factor of two, two years down the road is the end of the "C" in FRC. (I freely admit that there is a bigger issue with the doubling of awards like CA, WFA, etc., see (1)).
7) We should all recognize here on CD that this change doesn't really directly affect the majority of FRC teams. A giant percentage of teams only sporadically (if ever) attend Championships, so no, they're not going to be disappointed that they're not going to see their friends from the other side of the country and they're also not going to be wringing their hands over exactly who will be crowned THE World Champion. I'm not saying this to minimize people's reservations, I myself am flying to STL to be with my team and to see old friends from around the world. I'm putting it out there so that we keep in mind that most FRCers (as hard to believe as it is) actually aren't reading this thread right now.
8) I am willing to give FIRST HQ the benefit of the doubt here. They didn't make this decision in a vacuum (even if they didn't directly ask for input). You may have noticed that many people in this thread have spoken about how transformational the Championship experience was for them. In fact, many are so passionate about it that they're up at 01:30 writing a post instead of sleeping. But note that they talk about GOING to championship and SEEING and TALKING to the Poofs*, not watching a webcast of Einstein with bated breath or just HEARING about the Poofs' autonomous skillzzzz. So maybe, just maybe, when Don Bossi says "... we want to give more and more kids that 'Championship Experience' that we know is so transformative in their lives..." we actually agree with him ; even if not in the specifics.

I know this is getting super long, so I'll end it with a brief anecdote: In between trying to keep up with this thread I got an email from a newly-minted MARS alum who, in the greatest tradition of procrastination, decided to write down some of her MARS memories for a project that we call 'Marvin's Journal.' And it struck me that for every memory like this:

"I remember when we won our first team award at worlds, and screamed “WE ARE MARS” from the nosebleed section. - 2013 St. Louis World Championship"

There were two like this:

"I remember when it felt like I was changing either Marvin V’s drive belts or polycord belts every match. - 2012 Da Whole Season"

"I remember when we lost with MORT, and then became best friends. - 2011 Palmetto Regional"

And it reaffirmed my sincere belief that as long as this is how the students experience and remember FIRST, we'll be okay. We may we wish and work to make things better (as we should), and we may even gripe. But at the end of the day I'm still going spend Thursdays crawling under robots with a flashlight and an inspection checklist, and I'm still going hurt my hands clapping for that rookie team who's robot was a true GP-community-effort, and I'm definitely still going to bawl my eyes out when MARS wins Chairman's - and that's what really matters.


-Luke Scime


*Specific shout-out only because you guys are awesome and have been featured so prominently in this thread.

[James1902]

500+ passionate posts from a group of usually very busy people on the subject of what is, to the outside world, a high school extracurricular activity...if we're not an amazing fandom I really don't know what is.

As someone who has worked to present FIRST as a form of entertainment for people inside and outside the program (which I think is consistent with the goals of FIRST) I have an issue with a narrative that lacks a satisfying conclusion. "One Championship event, bringing together competitors from around the world to have one shot at un-paralleled glory and prestige" is just a more compelling story than "two "Championship" events that bring most of the competitors from a certain area of the world to have a shot at equal prestige as that other competition". This just makes it more difficult to tell the story of the FIRST season, and that's already pretty difficult as it is.

Change is a fact of life. We grow, evolve, regenerate, and usually we move on, better than we were before. With the way FIRST is growing some sort of adjustment must be made, I think a majority of us agree with this sentiment.

Does this mean I like the changes they've made? No.

Is it driving me to quit the program? Probably not.

Have I become that annoying mentor who asks rhetorical questions to make a convoluted point? ...

I'm hoping that FIRST has a longer term plan for this system that addresses my concerns, but if they do I wish they would have made that clear when they made this announcement.