[FRC Blog] Two Championship Survey Results and Path Forward

[Loose Screw]

I still think the idea of super-regionals is the best for FIRST. The district system is also the best imo. My FTC students had just as much fun at super-regionals as I did when I went to worlds. If FIRST wants to give that experiance to as many teams as possible, this system is the way to go.

Districts --> State (or region) Champs --> Super Regionals --> Worlds.

Districts allow teams to grow between events, rather than stop at one event. DCMP's have shown to be as exciting as even worlds, and super regionals would add another challenging event.

Super regionals would narrow the teams down to the best 100 or so in the world. Worlds could then be used to show and inspire teams everywhere if the production value of the broadcast is excellent. Having one pool of teams to pick from at the best event would produce the most competitive finals; rather than splitting these teams up across divisions and two venues.

I think this method works perfectly for FTC right now, and could work well for FRC in future years

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Loose Screw

I still think the idea of super-regionals is the best for FIRST. The district system is also the best imo. My FTC students had just as much fun at super-regionals as I did when I went to worlds. If FIRST wants to give that experiance to as many teams as possible, this system is the way to go.

Districts --> State (or region) Champs --> Super Regionals --> Worlds.

Districts allow teams to grow between events, rather than stop at one event. DCMP's have shown to be as exciting as even worlds, and super regionals would add another challenging event.

Super regionals would narrow the teams down to the best 100 or so in the world. Worlds could then be used to show and inspire teams everywhere if the production value of the broadcast is excellent. Having one pool of teams to pick from at the best event would produce the most competitive finals; rather than splitting these teams up across divisions and two venues.

I think this method works perfectly for FTC right now, and could work well for FRC in future years

FTC season starts in August/September (can't recall) and ends in April. FRC season starts in January and ends in April. Expanding the season is HARD.

[Loose Screw]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

FTC season starts in August/September (can't recall) and ends in April. FRC season starts in January and ends in April. Expanding the season is HARD.

You'd have to add an extra event yes, but that would only be for the top 100 or so teams. It would be 5 events for some teams, but some teams this year have attended 5 events. Expanding the season would be challenging, but I think it could be pulled off.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Loose Screw

You'd have to add an extra event yes, but that would only be for the top 100 or so teams. It would be 5 events for some teams, but some teams this year have attended 5 events. Expanding the season would be challenging, but I think it could be pulled off.

Have you ever tried to book travel for 40 students 1000+ miles, on 2 day notice? I haven't. But from what I've heard from the people that have, it's REALLY hard.

It's not about the number of events (we've done 6 the last 2 years) it's about the logistics of last minute travel and the lack of time frame to expand the season either way.

[Qbot2640]

Originally Posted by cadandcookies

I'm with Gregor on this-- every solution I've seen has been either inpractical or contrary to many of the goals FIRST or the posters in this thread have been advocating, or both. We're talking about FIRST footing what is likely a six-seven figure bill, causing students to miss school, and/or depriving one of our championships from seeing a champion crowned.

I really, really wish there was a better solution out there, but at the end of the day, it might be that the best we can do is try to make sure as many of us as possible are in Districts by the time these venue contracts are up.

Except that, as I pointed out previously, FIRST is no longer talking about this being a four year phenomenon:

Recent Blog Post:
"As we noted in the Championship informational session, the facts that there will be two Championships starting in 2017, and that all FIRST programs will be represented at each Championship, will not be changing, and so won’t be part of the discussions undertaken by these groups."

(Emphasis mine)

As opposed to the original, April 9 announcement:
"Therefore, in 2017, FIRST will host two Championship events on subsequent weekends, still celebrating our full Progression of Programs at each – one event in Houston at the George R. Brown Convention Center, the Toyota Center (home of the Houston Rockets) and Minute Maid Park (home of the Houston Astros) April 19-22, 2017, followed by a second event the following weekend (April 26-29, 2017) in St. Louis.

Beginning in 2018, our dual Championship will be celebrated in Houston, as described above, April 18-21, 2018 and on the second weekend in Detroit at the Cobo Center and Ford Field (home of the Detroit Lions), April 25-28, 2018. This alignment will continue for 2019 and 2020."

(Again, emphasis mine)

Can we please stop talking about bringing the two winning alliances together, as if that will solve the problem? We need a solution that lets FIRST achieve it's "inspire as many teams as possible" event goal, while still presenting a single, all-the-best-teams-present championship that is an honor to attend.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Qbot2640

Can we please stop talking about bringing the two winning alliances together, as if that will solve the problem? We need a solution that lets FIRST achieve it's "inspire as many teams as possible" event goal, while still presenting a single, all-the-best-teams-present championship that is an honor to attend.

Champs and "Poverty Champs"?

Sorry for going all ricky-bobby, but there's two champs (fact, it's happening, boo hiss whine complain). The only way to have a single "all the best teams" championship is one of them be the REAL championship. The other be "the other champs where we huck all the teams that don't really belong at a real championship".

This is not possible for a variety of reasons, the least of which is probably that I just said the phrase poverty champs.

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by Qbot2640

Can we please stop talking about bringing the two winning alliances together, as if that will solve the problem? We need a solution that lets FIRST achieve it's "inspire as many teams as possible" event goal, while still presenting a single, all-the-best-teams-present championship that is an honor to attend.

The whole point here, I think, is that the community assumes that teams at either of the championship events will be inspired aOnd everything from that aspect will be fine. But the community is hung up on the "one winner" concept, and needs to find a way to either accept winners from two events or find a way to get it back to "one winner".

Frankly, two champs poses two main problems from most of the communities point of view - having "one winner" and playing with/seeing the best teams. I think most have written off the latter as impractical with two events, and instead are trying to solve the former.

Personally, I'm more worried about the quality impact of holding two separate events, with two mostly separate volunteer crews - can we get enough volunteers, and if so can we keep quality consistent between the two events, or will differences creep up as the group's get separated? We already hear about different ways things are handled at different regionals or between different districts, but as it stands we have, currently, a single championship to help unite how we do things. With two events, how might things diverge?

[Siri]

Originally Posted by Citrus Dad

Those at the second event get to see ALL of the top teams, and by alternating dates, each location gets to see ALL of the top teams every other year, and they get to see at least the 50% of the top teams every year.

In addition how to possibly get all the Division Winners across the country in a week, there's currently no mechanism by which to alternate dates. Houston is first until at least 2021. (I would not want to be the person trying to pull off that booking arrangement even after that, but just so it's understand as functionally impossible for the Class of 2020.)

[Lil' Lavery]

While I agree the logistics of any post-season championship is difficult, weren't all 12 teams able to successfully travel to New Hampshire in 2012 for the Einstein report? For the teams that attended, how many members of the drive crews were able to come? Was it a significant issue to arrange the date and travel?

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

While I agree the logistics of any post-season championship is difficult, weren't all 12 teams able to successfully travel to New Hampshire in 2012 for the Einstein report? For the teams that attended, how many members of the drive crews were able to come? Was it a significant issue to arrange the date and travel?

If I remember correctly, one student and one mentor were flown in from each team. I believe FIRST covered all associate travel costs?

[BrendanB]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

While I agree the logistics of any post-season championship is difficult, weren't all 12 teams able to successfully travel to New Hampshire in 2012 for the Einstein report? For the teams that attended, how many members of the drive crews were able to come? Was it a significant issue to arrange the date and travel?

IIRC in 2012 it was two members from each team and people who were in that group would have to share if travel costs were covered.

Getting a whole team or a skeleton crew to make another trip isn't easy especially if its another round of airfare.

If FIRST can come up with a way to help with travel arrangements its doable as well as impacting minimal school days for already strained teams. Summer is also tough and really pushes your season out.

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by Michael Corsetto

If I remember correctly, one student and one mentor were flown in from each team. I believe FIRST covered all associate travel costs?

Yes, this is correct. Flights, hotels, and airport transportation were covered for two team members. Most teams chose to send one student and one mentor.

[Zebra_Fact_Man]

Originally Posted by Loose Screw

I still think the idea of super-regionals is the best for FIRST....

If I can condense you idea down even further. Your idea had 4 tiers; I think it can be done better in 3.
The reason most of the ideas proposed in this thread are bad is because they require additional travel/cost/time out of school for only the winning alliance(s), which will never fly if the main motivation is "inspiration". Thus, I suggest:

Tier 1: Districts and Regionals
Tier 2: District Championships and Super Regionals
Tier 3: World Championship

Regionals would feed into 100-400 team Super-Regionals (such as Houston or Detroit) [not directly into the WC]. The # of teams moving on from the Sup Reg to the WC would be proportional to the # of teams competing at the event, similar to how the # from a DCMP is proportional to the District size. District teams would be completely unaffected in this plan. Non US/Canada areas like Israel, China, and Australia could either convert to Districts immediately or just get a free pass to the WC if the desire to prevent them from flying to two America-located Championships exists.

This plan gives every team competing at a District OR Regional Event a persistent 25% chance to compete in a championship environment (for inspirational purposes), while maintaining the quality of the World Championship. Every event gets to see its champions crowned and all World Championship teams get to see the World Champion crowned.

[connor.worley]

What about this: FIRST runs 2 champs with a postseason tournament to decide the true winner. Then, some time down the road, they add two more championships and just send all 32 division winners to the postseason event. Kind of like super-regionals, just a backwards way of getting there.

[iVanDuzer]

Originally Posted by Andrew Schreiber

Champs and "Poverty Champs"?

Sorry for going all ricky-bobby, but there's two champs (fact, it's happening, boo hiss whine complain). The only way to have a single "all the best teams" championship is one of them be the REAL championship. The other be "the other champs where we huck all the teams that don't really belong at a real championship".

This is not possible for a variety of reasons, the least of which is probably that I just said the phrase poverty champs.

I would love to hear why a two-tier Championship model wouldn't work.

I disagree with the label "Poverty Champs." I'd rather call it "stepping stone," or "redemption" Champs.

Let's face it, the current system is not great at recognizing the truly "great" teams. Every year, there are teams with great robots that don't qualify for Champs, because of a variety of factors (bad luck, bad partners, they're the third-best-team at a deep event, ect). Are you saying that these teams, that would normally have no post-season play at a Championship event of any caliber, would feel slighted or cheated by attending a second-tier championship, and being given the chance to prove their ability?

There are also plenty of teams who attend Champs for "the experience" but otherwise gain nothing, because they are blown out of the water every single match. This is demotivating and disheartening on a regional level, and I'm sure it's similar on the World Stage. Having a second-tier championship event would give these teams an arena they could be competitive in. And if the people in this thread who say that the District Championships are inspiring are to be believed, why can't these second-tier Championships be just as inspiring as the World Championships?

What I propose are Super-Regionals, but not as a stepping-stone to the World Championships, but as an end goal. In my ideal world, all of FIRST would be converted to a district-points system, where FIRST takes each team's top event scores and uses that to determine who goes where. The top 400 teams go to the World Championships as they are now: four divisions, winners face off on Einstein. The 401st - top40% teams attend a Super-Regional.

I invite FIRST to set up more Championship events for the 2017 season. Super Regionals of 200 local teams. Not only is it much easier to find facilities for 200-team events, but they're also big enough to warrant the inclusion of sponsorship displays, scholarship rows, and seminar series.

Furthermore, this idea is scalable. Whenever one Super Regional fills up, simply add another to keep with FIRST's 25% (minimum) stat. This allows FIRST to keep their "quota" of FRC teams, while still running an exclusive, competition-oriented Championship.

And because this system adds another destination, and not another stepping stone, the FRC season does not go any longer than it is today. There will be some last-minute hotel bookings as teams find out where they compete, but that's the case right now as well (and it's the same case as any model FIRST can come up with).

In the short term, FIRST can take Houston (which I believe is scheduled for the week before St Louis / Detroit) and make it a Super-Duper Regional of 400 teams that services the area of two Regular Super-Regionals, and then "downgrade" to a regular Super-Regional in 2021.

(If all this sounds familiar, it's because I've already written about it here.)