Calling all students and mentors from the CHS, NC, and PCH Districts

[OccamzRazor]

I would vote district again and again. The level of competitive robots in NC has skyrocketed as a result of the change. It used to be that most teams in NC would register for the regional, play their 8 games, and then that was it if they did poorly plus they had very little time to learn and adjust. With a significant number of newer teams in the state, the regional model was difficult at best at producing competitive teams year after year. Not only that, teams from outside the state were coming in and getting a lot of the awards in the regional model because they had far more experience and resources than the majority of the teams in NC.

It took 2 years for a single NC team to win the NC Regional and that was 3506 during our rookie year as a last pick and we were aligned with two out of state teams....it was not by our own doing at all. That goes to say that it is now less competitive in the NC district model yet it is helping NC to be more competitive and I am curious to see what happens in years to come when this model produces some powerhouse teams and we flip the idea on its back that NC is not competitive.

With more plays, these teams get some time in between events to soak in information, make adjustments that they never had the chance to do, and it put them on the same level as the teams who could afford multiple plays in other regionals previously. I saw teams turn bricks into winning robots and I could feel the change, the energy, and the results were clear in that these teams were collectively better than they ever were before in the regional model.

We went to the NC&GA regionals last year and NC&OH regionals the year before that. 6 hour and 8 hour drives respectively outside of the NC state regional.

In districts both of our first qualifying events were 1.5 hours away and our third competition that did not count for district points was 3 hours away. State Championships was in our home town. This was absurdly cheaper and easier for us and we got more than twice as many matches out of it than our 4 previous regionals and Championship plays combined.

I think the change is immensely helpful and it will give NC an Einstein winning robot that it has not had since 2004.