pic: Districts in Minnesota Flyer

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by EricLeifermann

Semi secret meetings about the future of FIRST in regions benefits no one and especially those that you feel you are helping, the CUSTOMER.

Back in 2012, lead mentors go this email from FIRST CA RD's

Hello FRC Team Leaders,

Welcome back to another school year and another season of FIRST Robotics. Jim Beck and I, along with the rest of the Regional Directors, had a very productive and informative meeting in June back at FIRST headquarters in Manchester. FIRST has completed a very comprehensive strategic plan which provides many new opportunities and challenges for us all. One of these, which has an effect on all of us, is the FRC competition model. As many of you know, Michigan has piloted a district competition model for the last few years as well as the Mid-Atlantic Region last year. This ‘District’ type model has proven effective and is one that FIRST would like to see more regions adopt moving forward, with the hopes that all areas meeting the qualifications will follow this model in the future.

California, which has the largest concentration of FIRST teams in the nation, is being considered by FIRST to adopt this model sooner than later. It is anticipated that we will present a California model to FIRST based closely on the current district model in the near future. That being said, there is no doubt that this is going to take a lot of effort on everyone’s part but it is certainly the hope that once adopted a California model will allow for more robot play ,with less travel and thus lowering the cost and improving the overall experience of FRC for California teams.

We know that there are and will be many questions as we consider this model and this is why we have asked FIRST headquarters to come out and present to all of the California teams. The presentation will be conducted by Roseann Stevens - VP of Field Operations, Steve Chism - SVP/CAO and Andrea Winegar - National Grants Program Manager and will cover what this model looks like, what next steps are and any questions you may have. In an effort to accommodate all the teams, we will be holding the same presentation in four cities throughout the state (San Jose, Sacramento, Los Angeles and San Diego).

We are inviting up to three adult members from each California team to attend one of the four presentations. It will be up to you to determine which of the four locations will work best for you to attend. We would really like to see representation from each team so please make every effort to have at least one representative from your team attend one of the presentations. Below you will find the date, time and location for each presentation. Please click on the link below and fill out the quick form to let us know who will be attending from your team and which location you intend to attend we would greatly appreciate it for planning purposes.

Should you have any question please do not hesitate to contact Jim Beck in Northern California, [snip] or David Berggren in Southern California, [snip]. We are very excited about the future of FRC in California and the California FRC model, and look forward to seeing all of you at the presentations. Thank you.

I attended this meeting near Sacramento in October 2012.

Not a lot has happened since then (that I'm aware of), and even less has been communicated to teams regarding future plans.

No one has told me we need more volunteers, more venues, or more funding for anything on the horizon in CA FIRST's plans.

If CA switches, we'll host an event. I already offered to our RD's to host the Sac Regional in 2017 since we're leaving UC Davis (to expensive!), but haven't heard back. We hosted CCC 2015 at our school fairly easily this past fall. It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to host an event.

Personally, I don't want to fight for districts in CA with RD's who might loose their jobs if/when we make the switch. I'll let someone else wade into that mire.

Until CA FIRST says "here's what we are planning, here's what we need, who can help?", I'll continue to put my time and energy towards helping people who are receptive to my input. 1678 and our 24 new FLL teams in Davis (soon to transition to Vex IQ!) is not a bad place to start.

The sad part is, I want districts for every other team in CA, not my own. We have all our competition fee's covered by one sponsor, so three events in NorCal for $13,000 isn't too bad for us. It's the rest of the teams we play with that suffer under this outdated system, where hundreds of thousands of dollars that should go to STEM get burned on Union A/V crews and expensive venues.

Wake up sheeple!

-Mike