Future First Championship News

[Rachel Lim]

I think at this point it's important to look back and understand what exactly caused some (many) people to be very upset with this news, while others are either less certain on their side or like it. This is my interpretation, when I tried my best to step back from everything I dislike about it and see it from farther back.

It starts with FIRST's vision: "To transform our culture by creating a world where science and technology are celebrated and where young people dream of becoming science and technology leaders."
And their mission statement: "Our mission is to inspire young people to be science and technology leaders, by engaging them in exciting mentor-based programs that build science, engineering and technology skills, that inspire innovation, and that foster well-rounded life capabilities including self-confidence, communication, and leadership."

At it's most basic, FIRST aims to inspire students to go into STEM fields. There are obviously many ways to do this. One way is through engineering challenges.

But FRC wasn't created to be an engineering challenge. It's in it's name, FIRST Robotics Competition. It's in the way FIRST describes it, sport of the mind. That was the issue with Recycle Rush: it was more of a challenge than a sport. That is the issue with the split champs: it is more suitable for a challenge than a sport. That is the issue with having more than one champs and more than one winners: it's no longer a competition.

A challenge pushes teams to do the best that they think they can do. A competition pushes teams to do better than the best that they think other teams can do. Often, a competition is necessary to complete a challenge. Consider the space race--would we have landed on the moon nearly as soon if the Cold War hadn't been raging? On the other hand, Curiosity landed on Mars without the need of a war (or the threat of one).

What is my point, then? Challenges and competitions can both push people to do their best. They can both lead to incredible results. They can both inspire students. But they're very different. They attract different people. They inspire differently.

When they said "change is coming," looking back on it, it could be interpreted to say FRC is turning away from being a sport to becoming a challenge. This is the decision FIRST has to make, and the one that we're divided on. Should FIRST continue to try and change our culture by making FRC more like a sport, or by turning it into an engineering challenge? Should the "C" in FRC stand for competition or challenge?

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Rachel Lim

What is my point, then? Challenges and competitions can both push people to do their best. They can both lead to incredible results. They can both inspire students. But they're very different. They attract different people. They inspire differently.

I mostly agree with your analysis between the differences between challenges and competitions, but what I don't agree with is how splitting champs into two events automatically places FRC into the challenge category, completely taking away the competition.

It's STILL a competition. FIRST/FRC has never said that they are about ONE winner. In fact, every year we have THREE winners. If we truly wanted the best of the best of the best to win, then perhaps we shouldn't call the second and third robots on Einstein winners...

[TDav540]

Originally Posted by Rachel Lim

When they said "change is coming," looking back on it, it could be interpreted to say FRC is turning away from being a sport to becoming a challenge. This is the decision FIRST has to make, and the one that we're divided on. Should FIRST continue to try and change our culture by making FRC more like a sport, or by turning it into an engineering challenge? Should the "C" in FRC stand for competition or challenge?

After considering this for a significant period of time, I'm come to the conclusion that, in my opinion, FRC still stands for competition. Follow me through the end:

District competitions still crown one set of champions. So do district championships and regional competitions. These are still competitive events, and make up the majority of the events in FRC. Are they the goal of the FRC super-elite? Not necessarily, but they are still an integral part of the FIRST Robotics experience, and I would easily call these competitions.

Does not having a single, world champion alliance make that big a difference? To some, for sure, but I still think having six or eight champions is nearly no different from four. Think about the Einstein finalist from the last season: sure they didn't beat the eventual champions, but I could easily imagine a world where that alliance squeaked out a F3 win. So two champion alliances doesn't bother me from that perspective: it still is a competition.

I agree with the idea that FIRST is moving toward a challenge-based game series rather than sports. Whether this is good or not is entirely up to the individual. But I still believe it is a competition. We still have two alliances competing, even if only loosely this year. We still name winners. We still aim to score the highest, instead of just achieving a time or a number. If the GDC ever makes the game end at a certain score, or stop the match at a certain time once the goal is achieved, then maybe we will have to consider FRC a challenge instead of a competition. But for now there still is an element(s) of competition, and I treat it as such.