Why is Engineering Inspiration viewed as second place to the Chairman's Award?

[Red2486]

I think that a lot of this comes from EI and CA genuinely having a lot of overlap. EI focuses on strength of partnership within the team, school, and community. Sustainability and measurable reach are the primary components of EI, but they are also components of the Chairman's Award. A good CA team will most likely be a good EI team as well.

As far as competing at the Championship, I believe the teams that best embody each award should win the award. Maybe these teams, who don't win EI at the their qualifying events, win at the Championship because they are the best EI teams, but were awarded the Chairman's Award because they were also the best at that, and that award is more prestigious.

As far as judging goes, I think EI teams are actually at an advantage. Chairman's Award teams have an extremely limited time with the judges and their interactions are very restricted. Judged awards give teams more time with the judges and the ability to talk about their work with multiple panels of judges.

On a final note, one of the teams that best embodied Engineering Inspiration to me is GaCo 1629. They have an excellent program that is geared toward Engineering Inspiration and won multiple Championship EI's back when only one was given. While they have earned Chairman's Awards since then, I would look to them as an outstanding EI team.