Is Missouri Headed Toward Districts

[Ryan Dognaux]

Missouri and Kansas are in discussions to form a district. It may not occur until 2018 though. There's hope that inter-district play will be in place by then so our Illinois friends can come to the St. Louis area events.

[New Lightning]

Thanks for the info, just wanted to see what was going on.

[Joe Johnson]

All I can say is, "Come on in, the water is fine!"

Districts have some down sides but for my money, they are an almost unalloyed good thing.

I think it is better for teams, better for FIRST, and better for FIRST's growth.

On that last point take a look at the attached chart. I know, I know, I KNOW! Correlation is not causation but FiM has a strong case for causality.

When FiM formed, there were about 100 teams in Michigan and the team count was asymptotically approaching about 125 teams and then... ...DISTRICTS. Boom! Exponential growth returns.

FiM has been like a dog on a ham bone about driving the costs down for teams. And THAT is the Causation Component. Lower costs has lead to more teams.

FiM has lowered the cost for teams with subsidies where they can get them and by running dirt cheap districts in as many localities as they can.

So... ...MO, I urge you to follow the MI path. Join the move to Districts and then fight hard to lower the costs for teams to participate.

Dr. Joe J.