Team CMP Assignment 2017

[JB987]

Doesn't your school district allow your team to fly (allowing you to save classtime in your case). So very many of the rest of us are forced to fly regardless (just check out the terminals at the St Louis Wednesday or Sunday of Champs). Many times a bus can cost a team more overall than airfare or if airfare costs more it's just a matter of some additional fundraising on kid's part to manage the cost increase. Many of the rest of us will never benefit from an in-state or nearby Champs bus drive trip opportunity. That said, if your district doesn't allow for alternative air travel, it would be a shame to see you miss out should you face the travel inequity so many of us will continue to face in the coming years. Many teams (like us) don't take the whole team to Champs in large part because of the cost burden on kids and team...

[Michael Blake]

Originally Posted by JB987

Doesn't your school district allow your team to fly (allowing you to save classtime in your case). So very many of the rest of us are forced to fly regardless (just check out the terminals at the St Louis Wednesday or Sunday of Champs). Many times a bus can cost a team more overall than airfare or if airfare costs more it's just a matter of some additional fundraising on kid's part to manage the cost increase. Many of the rest of us will never benefit from an in-state or nearby Champs bus drive trip opportunity. That said, if your district doesn't allow for alternative air travel, it would be a shame to see you miss out should you face the travel inequity so many of us will continue to face in the coming years. Many teams (like us) don't take the whole team to Champs in large part because of the cost burden on kids and team...

Joe... we could fly.

In fact, _ I FLY_ because I'm an adult with some money in my checking account... you won't catch me on a charter bus (did it _once_ at 2011 CHAMPS)... ;-)

But for the rest of the team taking the bus versus flying it is a case of higher cost, substantially higher, than taking a charter bus with an all-inclusive cost of $10,000.00 because we bring 35-45 people--EVERYBODY involved with the team goes.

--Michael Blake

[mwmac]

Originally Posted by JB987

Doesn't your school district allow your team to fly (allowing you to save classtime in your case). So very many of the rest of us are forced to fly regardless (just check out the terminals at the St Louis Wednesday or Sunday of Champs). Many times a bus can cost a team more overall than airfare or if airfare costs more it's just a matter of some additional fundraising on kid's part to manage the cost increase. Many of the rest of us will never benefit from an in-state or nearby Champs bus drive trip opportunity. That said, if your district doesn't allow for alternative air travel, it would be a shame to see you miss out should you face the travel inequity so many of us will continue to face in the coming years. Many teams (like us) don't take the whole team to Champs in large part because of the cost burden on kids and team...

+1, QFT

[thatnameistaken]

Originally Posted by BMSOTM

If a team qualifies for champs at a regional and their regional and district CMPs are different, give them a choice. If they choose the Regional CMP, give the district an extra spot for its assigned championship. If they choose their district's championship, generate an extra wild card for the regional.

This makes a lot of sense. While it ends up generating an extra slot in the end, I don't think it would be a frequent enough occurrence to result in too many teams qualifying.

[Jacob Bendicksen]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Ryan... AMAZING they can afford all those airplane tickets for students, mentors, school administration, team-parents... and then transportation (local bus?) around hotels and meals... AND they can get someone to trailer their equipment to St. Louis and back.

They must be spending per team in the $15,000.00-$20,000.00 range just for transportation if they're taking their entire teams to CHAMPS!

--Michael Blake

Yep - I don't know of anyone who drove their entire team from the PNW to St. Louis this year. There were several teams who drove trailers and rented out space to other teams (our forklift didn't fit in our crate, so we sent it with 1510), but everyone else flew.

It ain't cheap goin' to champs from the PNW!

[EricH]

Originally Posted by mwmac

In my opinion, a geographic assignment model is not the simplest or fairest model for CMP venue assignment nor is it easily scalable. One complication that First has already identified is that it necessitates the creation of some formulation to permit teams to attend their non-home CMP. Of course, such a formulation would also require the creation of a rule set that governs the total number of non-home requests per season and per team and per time frame etc.

Actually, it is. To a point. The formulation can be rather simple: you start with the HoF teams and defending champions, figure out where they're going. (It's easier after the first year, because you have each event's defending champions.) Defending champions automatically go to their defending event--regardless of whether it's their home event--and HoF teams split about 50-50 by number (ask them which one they want to go to, and "time in HoF" is the tiebreaker if one event is full before the other).

The geographic assignment is actually quite scalable. It already covers the entire known FRC world. And it's quite simple: you'll go to the closest one to you (not necessarily measured in DISTANCE, mind you--could be measured in time or dollars) unless Plan B is invoked. Fair... Sorry, but life isn't fair.

Plan B is the "I want to go to the other championship" plan. I like the one outlined earlier by Basel: online, switch with either anyone or with a specific team. Simple, and it works.

Another issue with geographic team assignment is that it may, in the interest of maintaining equal numbers between venues, necessitate a regular revisiting of area boundaries as team growth rates are quite varied across the First landscape.

And that's a bad thing how? I wouldn't just anticipate a revisiting of area boundaries, but how about a regular revisiting of "Is this at the level it needs to be", "Do we need another CMP-level event", and other similar questions. And if those are addressed every couple of years or so, then that is a good thing.

I recognize that teams situated near each of the championsplit venues would be open to incurring higher travel costs should they be randomly assigned to the distant venue. That is the main drawback to this method that I see. However, as Orlando, Houston, Atlanta, St. Louis et al can attest, no venue lasts forever. I do believe this approach should at least be given some consideration by the First committee as an alternative to their geographic method.

As noted, we're not talking "higher" travel costs. We're talking HIGHER and HIGHER travel costs. Basically, if you're in TX or MI, you need to WANT to go to the other venue (reason for wanting to is up to your team--but there isn't anything saying FIRST can't offer an incentive). That simple.



I did notice the part about reducing travel burdens, or rather sharing them around. I think the best method there is to manage to get the Detroit CMP moved to the West Coast after the Detroit contract expires. (Houston can go to Atlanta or the East Coast.) I think that's somewhat reasonable, no?

[dodar]

Somewhere in California for the West Coast Championship and back to Atlanta for the East Coast Championship.

*Tongue in Cheek* Then back to the original high school gym for The Championship

[Michael Blake]

Is there any data out there on what percentage of teams fly to CHAMPS versus using ground transportation?

And is it usual practice for teams that fly to also rent local vans/buses for getting around venue/hotel/restaurants?

--Michael Blake

[BBray_T1296]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Is there any data out there on what percentage of teams fly to CHAMPS versus using ground transportation?

And is it usual practice for teams that fly to also rent local vans/buses for getting around venue/hotel/restaurants?

--Michael Blake

When I went with my team to CMP (once in Atlanta, once to STL) both times we used the subway/metro and walked.

Not sure on exact numbers but the STL airport was very crowded with many many teams. I imagine a majority of teams >500 miles (and reasonably close to a regional airport) fly to championships.

On our team, and I assume for lots of teams especially far from champs (PNW etc) only allow the most dedicated team members to go. It is certainly cost prohibitive to move lots of people across the country any way you try.

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Is there any data out there on what percentage of teams fly to CHAMPS versus using ground transportation?

And is it usual practice for teams that fly to also rent local vans/buses for getting around venue/hotel/restaurants?

--Michael Blake

For the teams I know well that have gone to St Louis CMP they have either stayed close enough to walk or used the Metro Link.

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Is there any data out there on what percentage of teams fly to CHAMPS versus using ground transportation?

And is it usual practice for teams that fly to also rent local vans/buses for getting around venue/hotel/restaurants?

--Michael Blake

We fly and rent a van.

Thank goodness for split champs.

Now we'll get to fly and rent a van.

-Mike

[Lil' Lavery]

A large part of the rationale FIRST laid out for the dual Championships was saving travel costs. A purely random assignment of teams between the two Championships undoes that.

For instance, there is a MASSIVE population of teams in Southeast Michigan, Ontario, Indiana, and Ohio within an easy drive of the Detroit Championship. Many of the Southeast Michigan teams could even do it as a daytrip (potentially on schoolbuses), slashing the travel costs to near zero. If 50% of these teams end up assigned to the Houston Championship, the costs savings rationale is completely out the window.

Now I realize that for a large portion of FRC, the cost of travelling doesn't really change all that much. We've seen plenty of comments reflecting that from west coast teams. Ultimately a large portion of these teams, especially those that qualify in-season, are going to want to go to the later of the two championships for logistic reasons*.

*The exception being where one championship may interfere with state or AP/IB testing preparation, prom, etc.

[Thad House]

Originally Posted by Michael Corsetto

We fly and rent a van.

Thank goodness for split champs.

Now we'll get to fly and rent a van.

-Mike

Wow. What an improvement. That's going to save so much money. /s

For split champs to be an improvement at all, any team outside of a 15 hour drive to the event HAS to be assigned to the later event. Once you are outside of 15 hours, it is more efficient to fly rather then drive, and the later the champs are, the tickets might be slightly cheaper.

In the US, the only areas further then a 15 hour drive from either champ are the tip of Florida at 16 hours from Houston, and then basically anywhere North or West of the line between Phoenix and Denver. I remember somebody did the math when they announced that, and it was about 700 teams. Unless some of those teams explicitly want to go to the other champs, they should always be assigned to whichever one is later.

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by Thad House

Wow. What an improvement. That's going to save so much money. /s

For split champs to be an improvement at all, any team outside of a 15 hour drive to the event HAS to be assigned to the later event. Once you are outside of 15 hours, it is more efficient to fly rather then drive, and the later the champs are, the tickets might be slightly cheaper.

In the US, the only areas further then a 15 hour drive from either champ are the tip of Florida at 16 hours from Houston, and then basically anywhere North or West of the line between Phoenix and Denver. I remember somebody did the math when they announced that, and it was about 700 teams. Unless some of those teams explicitly want to go to the other champs, they should always be assigned to whichever one is later.

Here are some numbers Andrew Schreiber ran in another thread:

Teams within 600 miles:
Detroit: 1482
Houston: 260
STL: 1049

FIRST HQ will likely assign a majority of those 1482 teams (which is about half of FRC) to the Detroit Half-Champ (within bus/driving distance). Therefore, it is likely a majority of teams going to Houston will be flying to the event.

Luckily, Houston is the later Half-Champ, so we can all save on airline trav-... Oh wait, nope.

-Mike

[Lil' Lavery]

We've seen it repeatedly in district discussions as well, but there seems to be a conflation of "this will save FRC team [in general] money" with "this will save my specific FRC team money." It does raise an interest point of emphasis, regarding measures taken to help teams that don't help ALL teams.