Eliminating "Start Build Day"

[EricH]

Let's look at this from an "overall" perspective. I'm going to assume that there are exactly three options for Kickoff (earlier, later, and status quo), and exactly two for Stop Build (6 weeks, or none AKA final event). I'm also going to make some assumptions about what the events do, because that's a piece of the puzzle. Minimum available build time is assumed at 6 weeks--no less.

So...
Kickoff later. All right, regardless of what Stop Build does, the events have to shift for this one. You get maybe one week before that shift happens, and one week does roughly nothing. If events shift, CMP hits AP testing. Well... Ouch. If we shift further, the events hit AP testing, which may be easier to work around (or not!), but CMP starts hitting the end of some school years. This would be great (you don't have to take off school to compete at CMP) except that a number of students won't be able to participate due to school requirements (varies by school, but there are schools with that sort of policy). Best bet: really nasty hurdles any way you look at it, so probably not going to happen.

Status quo... well, aren't we talking about changing that? I think we all know what happens here.

Kickoff earlier. This gets really interesting depending on the Stop Build policy and when the events schedule.

Option 1: Kickoff at CMP/early summer. This option, on a 6-week schedule, is ludicrous--unless you start having events in the fall. Gotta do a much later stop build, if at all. And then you get the "what about the offseasons" question, and the whole summer break... At the same time, I think I could see this one being plausible, if the events were moved up about 3 weeks. (To be noted: this option will give teams an incentive to stay together all year. Teams that do that tend to do pretty well compared to the "6-week" teams.)*

Option 2: Kickoff at the beginning of the school year/late summer. Plausible--but bear in mind that some teams are barely starting to re-gather. If a 6-week schedule is run, it'll basically be the returning vets doing everything and spring will become training time prior to the events. Most plausible scenario would be an October Kickoff for a 6-week; naturally if stop build was eliminated there'd be some fudge factor. Again, events would probably need some fudge factor but that can be dealt with.

Option 3: Kickoff in November/December. All I'll say on this one is that many teams will be shut down for weeks (under threat of permanent shutdown by parental protest to school administration), so 6-week schedule is toast. 8-10 weeks if there is a limit. Otherwise, much the same as before. I could see this one working out IFF the stop build went out by about 3 weeks (length of build), with no events until March, or there wasn't a stop-build.

Overall... given the scheduling issues for a later Kickoff, Kickoff would have to be earlier, which opens a pretty good can o' worms, either in storing the robots for long time periods or in allowing work over a major school break. Moving events earlier as well could help, but would cut down on the number of offseason events (cheaper than official, and great for training). I'd have to say that for now, keeping the status quo is actually the best option, pending further research and discussion.

*Option 1 actually lends itself to an alternative scenario, which could work with smaller robots but not at this scale: 3 competitions/year. New game announced at each Championship, or one random "old game", limited build, shorter competition season. At the FRC scale, that ain't happenin'.