The Evolution of Chairman's Teams

[dsmoker]

As a mentor who has been supervising our Chairman's team since 2007, I want to weigh in here. I think, just as there are many approaches to succeeded on the field, there are many approaches to succeeding in the Chairman's arena. I don't think that you need the resources to do international outreach. As other posters have stated, I think it's important to pick you areas of focus and concentrate on them. What kinds of outreach do you want to do? What is important to you as a team?

We have a comparatively small, inner-city team. We're not, and probably won't ever, have the resources to go to China or any other country to do outreach there. But there's a huge need right in our own backyard, and that's what we've chosen to address. When we started this journey with our first submission in 2007, I told our students we're doing this NOT to win the award, but to grow as a team, year-round. We started with simple things - shake-the-cans at local grocery stores to raise money and spread the FIRST message, demonstrations at local schools, libraries, museums, etc.

Flash forward to 2016 and we're hosting an FLL tournament for the third straight year, mentoring an FLL team, helping a team in the Netherlands by shipping stuff to them, translating documents for a 3-D printing project (we have many students who speak multiple languages) and making blankets for kids in the custody of the Department of Children and Family Services. Things I never thought we'd be doing nine years ago. Plus, we continue our grass roots efforts, demonstrating the robot at the typical places listed above but also at fairs, parades, festivals and even a camp for children with cancer.

My message - striving for the Chairman's Award is not one-year thing. It's a long-term process, with rewards that go well beyond the blue banner. And you don't need to be big, flashy or international to win, as demonstrated by our team, which has won district Chairman's Awards in 2014 and 2015 and a district championship Chairman's Award in 2015.

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by Karthik

Do you have an official source on this? I've never seen it in any documentation. I have no idea it's true or not, but if it is, it would seem strange to me that the judges wouldn't be allowed to share the information they learned during the presentation.

Yes and no. I've talked to several judges and also an ex head judge. You will not find official documentation on this, because the FRC judge training information is only available to judges. But judges will tell you that the Chairman's judges are not supposed to talk to other judges. Chairman's judges are not supposed to share information. Even if they were, they rarely have enough time at an event anyway, especially given the number of teams submitting at a given event increasing with the rule change last year allowing presenting at multiple events. In fact, the only information RCA judges are allowed to share with other judges is "hey, this team is the team we selected for RCA," and the other judges may use that information to decide on other awards (i.e. if a team wins RCA, but the EI judges selected them for EI, the EI judges will select another team instead). But that's the extent of the information that is shared.

Originally Posted by MysterE

I believe this may also be a regional to regional thing. I know at the Bayou Regional this is true - coming from the Head Judge himself. The RCA judges do not go through the pits at all and make all decisions based on what they learn in the Interview Room and in the Essay and Executive Summary.

But I've also been to regionals where our presenters have seen RCA judges walking around the pits.

Yes, RCA judges CAN walk around the pits and talk to teams. However, they are not supposed to get information from other judges. They are only allowed to gather information that they collect themselves. So you will sometimes see RCA judges walking around the pits if they have their selection narrowed down to a couple teams, to get some more information. However, they cannot solicit information from other judges, and likewise Chairmans judges cannot give information to other judges. In other words, everything that goes into the selection of RCA comes only from the information the RCA judges themselves collect from the team in the submission, presentation, pit interviews, and their own research (i.e. looking at your website, etc).

My point was that NOTHING you say in the Chairman's room is given to other judges at the event, including those judging for EI, and vice versa. They don't even have access to your chairmans submission (essay and questions) unless you give it to them in a handout (which we sometimes do).

This further proves that the two awards are in fact separate from each other. In fact, before the rule change allowing submitting for RCA at multiple events, we usually won EI at events where we did NOT submit for Chairman's.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

This further proves that the two awards are in fact separate from each other. In fact, before the rule change allowing submitting for RCA at multiple events, we usually won EI at events where we did NOT submit for Chairman's.

I'm pretty sure Talon 540 won the EI in Virginia by specifically NOT submitting for the RCA in 2013 and 2014.


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If shaking the stigma of EI being referred to a second place chairman's is important to people, has anyone proposed giving EI winners a hot pink or neon green medal instead of silver compared to Chairman's gold?

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

I'm pretty sure Talon 540 won the EI in Virginia by specifically NOT submitting for the RCA in 2013 and 2014.


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If shaking the stigma of EI being referred to a second place chairman's is important to people, has anyone proposed giving EI winners a hot pink or neon green medal instead of silver compared to Chairman's gold?

I thought having two different award names with two different judging criteria and two different sets of judges was enough to not make that assumption.