Are 8 play regional reasonable?

[Caleb Sykes]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

So how exactly do you recruit more FTAs into the region if there are only three FTA "spots?" If the regionals don't advertise that they need FTAs, because all their FTA spots are filled, how is anyone supposed to learn how to do the job or even know that it is needed?

The same thing goes with any other key volunteer position. I hear this argument all the time: "My region can't go into districts because we don't have enough key volunteers." But how are you supposed to get those key volunteers if there is nowhere for volunteers to go? In other words, you really have to just bite the bullet and go into districts in order to get those key volunteers. You won't get enough volunteers for 16 district events if you only have three regionals to put your volunteers in. I think you'd be surprised how many volunteers will show up if the spots are open.

This. I couldn't volunteer this year because my team is competing at Iowa and Minneapolis, and I had a test on the Thursday of the Duluth events. If there were more events, particularly if those events were relatively local and I didn't have to miss much/any school, I would gladly volunteer at a couple of events.

I doubt that I am alone in this regard.

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

FTA's have FTAA's. LRI's have inspectors. Head Refs have refs. The list goes on, but the point is that every key position has others they work directly with - that's where those volunteers go. If you look at FIRST's list of volunteer positions, you can probably figure it out - most of the positions even tell you the exact experience needed - for example, LRI's require two years of prior experience as inspectors. Head Ref's need to ref for two years. It's spots like that where the whole "if you build it, they will come" thing falls apart - it doesn't matter if we have 200 volunteers show up for every event - if we don't have experienced Ref's, we won't have a Head Ref to run it. That's the issue when people say "we don't have enough key volunteers" - they mean we don't have enough when considering those we currently have and those ready to step up when there's room for more key's.

If anyone is interested in a key position, whether it appears "full" or not, your best bet is to approach someone in that key role or the VC (whom you should know, as you're already volunteering!) and tell them that you're interested. Ask them what you can do to work towards the position and who you should be talking to. I know it hasn't always worked out that way for LRI's in MN (all of the current LRI's, including myself, were asked to step up to fill the need, but one of the ones in training came to us and told us he wants that position when he's ready), but ideally that's how it would work. Then we would have a list of interested people to keep an eye on, and call up when needed. The problem is, we just don't have that many people banging down our doors for these positions!

And to what extent are those positions advertised in MN? Or in other areas for that matter? Has MN taken a proactive stance and put out a plea for these kinds of volunteers and say "if we want to move forward with the district system, we need trainees in these positions, so please volunteer?" In my experience, if you expect people to volunteer on their own to fill the voids, you won't get much. But if you ask them to volunteer and tell them why they are needed, you may get different results. People may not know that these kinds of volunteers are needed or why they are needed, even if it is up on FIRST's website for everyone to see. My hypothesis is that there are a number of people who would put in the time for one of these key positions if they knew how badly they were needed to move forward with districts, or even what the volunteers do. I'm sure we have many parents/mentors on our team who are clueless about where their abilities could be useful as an event volunteer. My other hypothesis is that there would be a number of potential volunteers that would be more likely to do so if the event was closer to them and they didn't have to miss work to do so (like a district event would be).

Again, I'm not from MN so this is just my educated guessing.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by nfhammes

I think there's a little nuance you're not bringing out here. If the goal is to have the best teams, teams who win RCA at their first event seems like an excellent way to ensure you get some of them. If the goal is to get the best robots, it obviously misses the mark, but that particular goal seems to do less to inspire kids and be what FIRST is about, that I would ignore it. (Admittedly, I wasn't there last year but...) I would love to see the MSHSL State Championship hand out awards to teams. Maybe they would be similar/the same/analogous to the normal FIRST set, or whittled down to a few important ones due to judging constraints, but I think that would go further in "figuring out the best of the best" in the right ways.

The problem with counting second events or not is fairness. If teams simply got credit for the better of the two events, (or even both events!) that would be obviously unfair in favor of teams with more resources. Averaging the two dampens the effect, and certainly allows a second event to harm teams, but many teams do tend to do better at later events, both through iteration, and sheer student experience, so you're still advantaging teams with more resources. Picking the first event seems to be the closest to rewarding "competitive" teams, while giving all teams a fair opportunity.

And on the topic of you "speaking for all teams" when saying that winning state is a big deal, it obviously isn't all of them, but the last time I was in MN, there were a good number of teams who see Winning State as a big deal, whose relationships with their districts and schools would be improved by winning an MSHSL banner, and would be further legitimized in their community. And I'm not sure those folks are well-represented on CD. I think it's not universal, but should be taken seriously. And MNFIRST knows this, and maintains a positive relationship with the good folks at the MSHSL.

In my post, I meant "best teams" as in the best teams on the field, aka best robots. Should've made this more clear.

I'm not sure why getting the best robots to the State Championship would inspire fewer kids. You're just inspiring a different group of students. Having the most competitive competition would inspire more students in my opinion by showing them the game being played at a high level.

With the current state qualification system, great teams (sometimes the best teams) miss out on qualifying for a competition that is supposed to (in my mind) determine the best robots. I won't pretend to know the solution to this issue, but I know taking a second event into consideration in some way would help.

I don't think "fairness" should be a factor, because I don't believe it's unfair to consider two events. Teams that attend two events worked hard to raise funds to do that second event. They put in the effort, they should be rewarded for doing so. The teams doing two events are iterating, and improving their robots in between events. When they show up at a 2nd event with a fantastic robot, they should be rewarded for that extra work that they've put in. If anything, it's more fair to consider a 2nd event.

I really like the concept if doing awards at the State Championship. Brilliant idea.

The question we really have to answer is: What is the purpose of the state championship? Is it to determine the best robots? The best teams? Is it to showcase FIRST in yet another off-season event? If we want to think of FRC as a sport, I think the purpose of the state championship should be to determine the best robots (athletes) in Minnesota.

Also, I wasn't the one who was "speaking for all teams", although we do share the same logo. Chief Hedgehog has taken back his comments, because nobody can speak for everybody.

[Bryan Herbst]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

In my experience, if you expect people to volunteer on their own to fill the voids, you won't get much. But if you ask them to volunteer and tell them why they are needed, you may get different results. People may not know that these kinds of volunteers are needed or why they are needed, even if it is up on FIRST's website for everyone to see. My hypothesis is that there are a number of people who would put in the time for one of these key positions if they knew how badly they were needed to move forward with districts, or even what the volunteers do. I'm sure we have many parents/mentors on our team who are clueless about where their abilities could be useful as an event volunteer.

Our regional director sent out an email yesterday to all team contacts requesting the following:

10,000 Lakes
Field Reset (7)
Flag assistants (2)
Safety Advisor (1)
Safety Glasses: Friday and Saturday
Spare Parts Desk (2)

North Star:
Welcome Table/Event Concierge (2)
Team Queuing (1)
Saturday - Safety Glasses attendants
Practice Field (1)

Volunteering for one of these positions is the first step towards many other positions.

Additionally, he sent out the following to all team contacts in December:

Technical Volunteers Wanted!

Volunteering is a blast at Minnesota FIRST Regional Competitions. Positions that require pre-event training are filling now, including Scorekeeper, Control System Advisor and Robot Inspector, for all four events. Events require a minimum of 10 robot inspectors, 2 CSAs, and 2 Scorekeepers. Sign up today via FIRST and the VIMS: https://my.firstinspires.org/FIRSTPo...IMS_Login.aspx. Questions can be sent to Laurie Shimizu, FIRST Senior Mentor & Volunteer Coordinator, at lshimizu@firstinspires.org.

No one is trying to keep volunteering a secret.

[jessss]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

With the current state qualification system, great teams (sometimes the best teams) miss out on qualifying for a competition that is supposed to (in my mind) determine the best robots. I won't pretend to know the solution to this issue, but I know taking a second event into consideration in some way would help.

The question we really have to answer is: What is the purpose of the state championship? Is it to determine the best robots? The best teams? Is it to showcase FIRST in yet another off-season event? If we want to think of FRC as a sport, I think the purpose of the state championship should be to determine the best robots (athletes) in Minnesota.

I think one reason the MSHSL tournament misses out on some of the best teams each year is because of the chairman's system we have set in place. If like you said we want to be a competitive tournament then we should not give 10 points towards every team that submits chairman's or even give teams that win chairman's at the regional level a spot to the tournament. Honestly I have my team submit chairman's every year even if we do very little outreach because we know we will get those points towards the state tournament.

I think the goals for the state tournament was that it is meant to showcase FIRST in Minnesota and usually when you have media personnel at events like these, you have them talk to kids who can inspire others through communicating with the news or a journalist. It normally makes for a better story if they are talking with students that can coherently convey the message of FIRST and do stuff for there community. I'm not in anyway saying that other teams cannot do this but usually you'll find that teams that produce chairman's submissions or have a strong speakers know how to make FIRST look good.

I think Minnesota needs to figure out their goals before going forward and changing their qualification system. If we want higher caliber teams at the state championship level then maybe implement something like you said, average of all the regionals a team attends. But if our goal is to inspire more like a showcase system and less like a competition it might be better to keep with the same system, from my experience a team are more likely to change their ways (from one regional to multiple) if they are invited to events like the MSHSL's competition or champs. If the state competition instead limits that opportunity for teams that for some reason do not currently go to more than one event there might be less of an attempt to try to get better.

[nuclearnerd]

I'm a bit late to this topic, but I have a left-field idea that keeps growing on me.

Would a 6 play regional, with 6+ minute long matches be so bad?

The pros are that the matches could be far more interesting and dramatic, with time to run more complex strategies (and to fail and adapt). They would also be more spectator friendly too, with gameplay to reset time ratio increased from worse than 1:1 to better than 2:1. The overall play time per team will not go down, in fact it will go up since less time per regional is spent doing field reset.

The con is that it is much less likely that the robots will seed in order of how "good" they are. Playoff alliances will be influenced strongly on luck and schedule strength, and what I see in this thread is that people consider this "unfair". Also we'd need batteries that can hold more charge, but that is trivial imho.

I would argue that unlikely playoffs are not a con at all! If we are so concerned that the "best" robots win, and we all seem to know what makes a good robot, lets just have them run a demo in front of a judge panel like show dogs. On the other hand, if we want robotics to be a sport, with all of the drama and excitement that entails, we need to open the space for underdog teams to catch a lucky first-seed pick and ride it to champs. Imagine an exciting, 6 minute finals match between two rookie teams with power-house teams as their first picks!

So, have I made my case? Who else is on team 6 minute matches?

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by nuclearnerd

So, have I made my case? Who else is on team 6 minute matches?

I know who isn't up for 6 minute matches, the batteries, at least with the amount of motors used on many robots, especially those teams with 6 CIM drives.

[nuclearnerd]

Originally Posted by Mr V

I know who isn't up for 6 minute matches, the batteries, at least with the amount of motors used on many robots, especially those teams with 6 CIM drives.

Understood, I mentioned that. But that's an easy easy fix. We could switch to bigger SLA batteries, or NIMH batteries of the same weight but larger capacity (though I'm having trouble finding a source right now, which is telling).

[jvriezen]

Originally Posted by Caleb Sykes

This. I couldn't volunteer this year because my team is competing at Iowa and Minneapolis, and I had a test on the Thursday of the Duluth events. If there were more events, particularly if those events were relatively local and I didn't have to miss much/any school, I would gladly volunteer at a couple of events.

I doubt that I am alone in this regard.

While team dynamics and needs will vary, I have volunteered during the events that my team participated in pretty much every year since 2009. If you have enough mentors attending the regional, some of them can volunteer. Volunteering at the event is a great way to model for your students the importance of volunteering to give back.

Also, you don't have to volunteer for the entire weekend, you can volunteer for only the days where you are available, although this may limit the positions you are eligible or selected for.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by jvriezen

Also, you don't have to volunteer for the entire weekend, you can volunteer for only the days where you are available, although this may limit the positions you are eligible or selected for.

Robot Inspector in particular, which Caleb has done before, is primarily needed on Thursday. I know both events in Minneapolis are at the minimum of 10 robot Inspectors at last check.

[nighterfighter]

Originally Posted by nuclearnerd

Would a 6 play regional, with 6+ minute long matches be so bad?

Yes.

If your robot fails to connect to the FMS, or something breaks on your robot, radio becomes unplugged or something, you lose a lot more playtime.

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

Robot Inspector in particular, which Caleb has done before, is primarily needed on Thursday. I know both events in Minneapolis are at the minimum of 10 robot Inspectors at last check.

Yes the need for inspectors is greatest on Thur for Regionals or load in night for District events. So it is certainly possible and highly desired to have people who are interested in doing Robot inspection on that day and then have the rest of the time free or do another job.

For example one of the RIs for my event this weekend will be queing after Thur night inspections, I've also had people who inspect load in and are then refs the other days.

[Caleb Sykes]

Originally Posted by jvriezen

While team dynamics and needs will vary, I have volunteered during the events that my team participated in pretty much every year since 2009. If you have enough mentors attending the regional, some of them can volunteer. Volunteering at the event is a great way to model for your students the importance of volunteering to give back.

Also, you don't have to volunteer for the entire weekend, you can volunteer for only the days where you are available, although this may limit the positions you are eligible or selected for.

One of our mentors will be volunteering at Iowa and 10K, and I would volunteer at our competitions as well if I thought that was the best usage of my time.

I understand that there are opportunities for me to volunteer in the regional system, but there are clearly vastly more readily available opportunities in the district system.

[cadandcookies]

Originally Posted by Caleb Sykes

One of our mentors will be volunteering at Iowa and 10K, and I would volunteer at our competitions as well if I thought that was the best usage of my time.

I understand that there are opportunities for me to volunteer in the regional system, but there are clearly vastly more readily available opportunities in the district system.

I completely sympathize with this post. There's a really interesting amount of calculation that goes into whether it's "worth" volunteering at an event-- part of that comes down to what you're doing (for example, I feel like I'm making much more of an impact as a CSA/FTA/emcee when I do FTC events than I do doing field reset at FRC, which makes me far more excited/willing to volunteer over working with my FTC team), how much the team needs you (at North Star, I'll be the mentor for 2667 that has the most FRC experience at the event, which is terrifying, especially for nearly a 10 year old team), and of course work/schedule conflicts.

Truthfully, I'd much rather be in a position to volunteer at North Star (and any event) than not, even if it means I'm just sitting at the safety glasses table. But there's definitely a hard call that needs to be made between that idealism and the reality that I'm probably helping more by making sure my team is running smoothly. I think that a lot of teams have mentors who have to make that call and, rightfully, pick their teams. This comes back to the main point of this thread-- by my count (which might be slightly off-- I did this manually) 166 MN teams are going to one regional event. The majority will not make elims, or qualify for Champs, or qualify for State. Those teams get EIGHT matches. So yeah, when it comes down to it, evaluating cost/benefit for taking one of the incredibly appealing roles Bryan posted as being open as a mentor, it's an obvious choice if you're not from a large team. For a lot of people helping their team and volunteering are mutually exclusive, and this is exacerbated by having double regionals (which shouldn't be misconstrued-- I love our events, it just makes volunteering at more than one other event difficult).

That situation changes when a team can attend more events, events within a reasonable distance are more common, events require less of a time commitment, or a team gets large/good enough that it can afford to lose a couple of mentors for a weekend (yes, this is probably an oversimplification, but I think it covers the main things).

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Sorry I haven't posted much here, out of the country at the Australian event. There seems to be a lot of conjecture on what actually takes place at an event and how volunteers are recruited and trained. If you really want to know ask. We have done a lot of training to get inspectors in Minnesota, and other positions as well, up to speed. Yes, the robot inspections on Thursday take a lot of effort, but that is not the only need. Events run better when inspection staff assist teams with robot problems and redesign throughout the weekend at any event. I want our inspectors to insure that all teams play every match to give the remaining teams a full alliance every time. That is a lot to ask but that is why we look for inspectors to be team members who actively have worked on a robot prior to volunteering. I want experienced people. Having worked in Minnesota since the beginning, I can tell you that there are some really great and knowledgeable people who work those events. Great refs, CSAs, FTAs and inspectors. It is actually pleasant to work in MN events as everyone is professional and very nice.
That being said, almost every event (not only MN) will have inspectors go to other roles, most often reffing and judging. CSAs and other volunteers will stick with their roles throughout the event but game dependent roles like field reset can have significant demands. Building a field can take most of a day or longer depending on the field and the venue. This year can take easily 20 people to unpack and setup and a similar number for teardown. Then there is the pit setup and teardown, volunteer check in, judges and a lot of other positions.
Six minute matches? I think you need to take a hard look at the last two year's games and you will soon realize that two minutes is an awful long time for the game and robots. Many teams do not design efficient mechanisms and will often run a battery down in just two minutes.