The Triplet Challenge

[Jack Jones]

Originally Posted by dlavery

Not to make too fine a point of it, but why there is even anything to debate on this topic any more? FIRST has been explicitly clear about this: collaboration is a good thing. ...

I don’t think anyone here is against collaboration, per se, but they don’t like the direction it has taken. They forebode a future where many more and even larger coalitions pull teams up by their bootstraps and then use them as soldiers at the only events they can afford to attend. IMO, any who can’t put themselves in the shoes of the also-rans who get caught in that crossfire are the ones who just don’t “get it.”

When will enough be enough? When eight coalitions bring in six teams each so that the other half of the field may as well pack-up during lunch?

Please excuse my naivety, but I thought there was an “I” in FIRST. Apparently not, because the Q&A gets quoted chapter and verse as the definitive doctrine to which we’ll abide. If that’s the way it is; if it’s take-or-leave-it, then I wonder how many will vote with their feet when they reach the conclusion that the only alternative is to become one little cog in a very big wheel.

[Beth Sweet]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

Please excuse my naivety, but I thought there was an “I” in FIRST.

If you want to see the I in FIRST, talk to the kids on the Triplets teams. Very rarely, if ever, have I seen kids so excited about this program and about engineering. I sat with these kids for 2 days at GLR. I watched their actions and I talked to them. IMO, they would be just as excited about FIRST and engineering even if they weren't winning. That is because their mentors are really doing their "I" jobs.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

Apparently not, because the Q&A gets quoted chapter and verse as the definitive doctrine to which we’ll abide.

For better or worse, Q&A is the definitive doctrine for that particular season. I can't say I've liked every call they've issued (someone will still have to explain to me the difference between paper-with-clear-tape and a label), but it is quite frequently a take-it-or-leave-it arrangement for the next three weeks. On the up side, FIRST does attempt to listen to us to improve the experience. (Kitbot, anyone?)

That said, going back to the original challenge, I can't find too much fault with it. The aim, at least the way I read it, is to bring the inspiration that tends to come with FIRST to areas where there hasn't been any (or hasn't been any in some time) while improving the teams' success both on and off the field to a level that might not normally be reached unassisted.

Perhaps, just as not everyone accomplishes Dean's homework, the Triplet Challenge might not be your thing. Or perhaps your partnership has more of a taste for Division by Chickens. Or perhaps you have your own model for helping out new or struggling teams. Just as your team probably has a bias towards wheels or treads or omni drive, do what works for your team. If the kids are enjoying it and getting inspired, what's the problem?

[Jonathan Norris]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

I don’t think anyone here is against collaboration, per se, but they don’t like the direction it has taken.

I believe Jack has got it here, we are not all against collaboration, It's just that for some of us we fell that it has gotten to an extreme. I know a lot of teams which have collaborated to help out with other teams during the season, and even to help get teams started look at 188 role in the early days of FIRST in Canada, and even ourselves 610 have helped to try and start a few teams. But I truly feel that there is now a difference between the original definition of collaboration where a more experienced team will help start a rookie team, and the collaboration we see now with the triplets and other teams. These teams have developed collaboration to a point where the more experienced team becomes much more involved in growing and developing the rookie teams, and they end up acting almost like one large team.

I am all for collaboration in the sense of experienced teams helping to start and keep alive rookie teams. But what I fear with this more extreme level of collaboration is that these rookie teams are resting on the knowledge of the more experienced teams, and not getting the full FIRST experience of going through the struggles and learning experiences of designing your first robot, getting funding for your first event, and gathering the required student support. The question is not are you against collaboration, it is do you feel that this level of collaboration is beneficial for the rookie teams in the long run, and for FIRST.

[Alexander McGee]

The fact of the matter is that people don’t want to see collaborated teams join together and win regionals together. When this happens, it makes people think that teams collaborate simply to win regionals. Whatever the real reason is, however good a team’s intentions may be, it is human nature to think this way.

If you are going to collaborate, prepare for an onslaught of criticism if you ally with the other teams at an event. There are too many people in this program who are against the concept in the first place (For whatever their reasons) to make it universally acceptable.

I personally don’t like the idea of collaboration. I feel there is importance in the rookie year for a team, to get a hang of how things work and to develop their own identity. Mentoring a rookie team or another team is fantastic, but I would disagree with holding the team’s hand throughout the season and building identical robots.

I believe that overcoming failure is just as important as success when you are actively developing student’s character and inspiring them into engineering. This concept pertains to building a team’s identity too.

People talk about inspiration here a lot. I ask, what kind of inspiration is most effective? I would argue that having teams build their own bot’ and having the students do the work is the best way, as would a lot of other people on these threads. However, stray from this ideal and you may be accused of covering up alternative intentions under the veil of “inspiration”.

The sad fact of the matter is that this actually does happen. The worst part it, it doesn’t happen nearly as often as people seem to think. Collaborated teams seem to get the finger pointed at them often for this.

So, morale of the story, if you are going to collaborate with another team, show exactly what your intentions are; do it clearly and publicly. Perhaps this will lessen the onslaught when you start succeeding.

[Joel J]

There is something "cheap" about these collaborations. Especially when people try to talk about the ethical reasons they collaborated. It sounds like spin.

But the collaborations I've seen thus far haven't really bothered me. So I guess the "cheapness" factor is just a glum outlook on what could happen in the future.

[rourke]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

When will enough be enough? When eight coalitions bring in six teams each so that the other half of the field may as well pack-up during lunch?

Please excuse my naivety

Jack,
I will excuse your naivety and your cynicism. This doomsday scenario will NOT happen on my watch! You will NOT see eight coalitions bringing six teams so that the other half of the filed may as well pack-up during lunch!!! I will NOT be a party to that.

But I GUARANTEE you will see bus-loads of inspired students flocking to FIRST events because they are inspired by the opportunity to which they have been afforded. And many will be there because collaboration makes it possible.

Now, everyone please stop saying the world is flat. There is irrefutable evidence that it is round, and collaboration is here to stay -- in every imaginable fashion under the rules. Now let's embrace it in a responsible manner. I was (naively) hoping that teams would post what they were planning - because I know there are some unique and creative things planned. I thought we would benefit from hearing about it! The negative spin only keeps the real activity underground -- which only hurts those that need it most!!!

As I scan the sections of the ChiefDelphi Forums, I see that there is a section missing. I now think it's time that there is a Forum Category dedicated to Collaboration. This no longer belongs in the General Forums.

[Alexander McGee]

Originally Posted by rourke

Jack,
I will excuse your naivety and your cynicism. This doomsday scenario will NOT happen on my watch! You will NOT see eight coalitions bringing six teams so that the other half of the filed may as well pack-up during lunch!!! I will NOT be a party to that.

But I GUARANTEE you will see bus-loads of inspired students flocking to FIRST events because they are inspired by the opportunity to which they have been afforded. And many will be there because collaboration makes it possible.

Now, everyone please stop saying the world is flat. There is irrefutable evidence that it is round, and collaboration is here to stay -- in every imaginable fashion under the rules. Now let's embrace it in a responsible manner. I was (naively) hoping that teams would post what they were planning - because I know there are some unique and creative things planned. I thought we would benefit from hearing about it! The negative spin only keeps the real activity underground -- which only hurts those that need it most!!!

As I scan the sections of the ChiefDelphi Forums, I see that there is a section missing. I now think it's time that there is a Forum Category dedicated to Collaboration. This no longer belongs in the General Forums.

It bothers me that you would refer to this as a “doomsday” scenario. One would think that you would love the idea of this, as it is what collaboration is and has ended up being for your teams at the events that you have been to.

I am a bit bothered by your assertiveness in this matter, as well as the way you seem to address the FIRST community. We are not ignorant nor are we unintelligent, and the “world is flat” digression is a bit condescending.

There are people who do not like collaborations. Period. Read some of the posts in this thread and others, you will see. Blatantly telling them that they are wrong and need to “embrace” it is unacceptable. People are entitled to their opinions and are certainly not going to change their minds any time soon.

You have three excellent, wonderfully designed robots which have won events several times. However, lots of people don’t like how you have been pairing up with your collaborators. The way they see it, you are in it to win. And, in some of their minds, if you are in it to win, you can’t be doing it for the right reason, which is inspiring students.

Yes, you will tell me and have that your students are inspired by what they have seen, but aren’t there better ways? I don’t pretend to know how your teams operate, and am not going to make any assumptions, but how inspired can your students be when there is spite surrounding you at the events? Everywhere I went at GLR, I heard spite about your teams and how “unfair” it was all day long. Is this really what you want?

Let’s hear from some of your students. Let them be the voice of your ideals and your method. You will not convince the community at large by simply telling them they don’t understand, and if you fail to convince them, the spite won’t ever go away.

[RogerR]

...Everywhere I went at GLR, I heard spite about your teams and how “unfair” it was all day long. Is this really what you want?...

i suspect that if the Niagara FIRST triplets hadn't collaborated this year, those that are complaining about the unfairness of the triplets would still be complaining; only they'd find some other reason to complain, be it that the top teams have more funding, more engineers, more shop time, etc. this is a problem, but it isn't the triplet's.

while teams 1503 and 1680 are obviously integral parts of this alliance, i feel safe in assuming that 1114 is the leader. the way i see it, team 1114 could have continued on there own, building dominant robots year after year, they instead decided to help two other teams. i can't count how many times i've seen someone post that a team could better use there money "helping out another less fortunate team" rather than building practice robots, ornate pits, flashy carts, etc. well, guess what? team 1114 seems to have taken those comments to heart. and now, i suspect, those same people who've in the past condoned other teams for there "opulent" practices are now whining about the dominating performance of the triplets.

so if some wish to complain about other's massive budgets and resources, thats to be expected; not every team can have huge machine shops, billion dollar sponsors, or teams of engineers at their disposal. but with modern communication, they shouldn't complain about the unfairness of collaboration; this is a case of "if you can't beat them, join them".

and finally, what is with this apparent taboo against playing to win? would i not be selling my teams short if i didn't do my very best to help them win? among my teams, we have a saying,"if you're not playin' to win, then you're just playin' ". this is after all, FIRST Robotics Competition. the way i see it, inspiration is inexorably linked to the competition. so it stands to reason, the more competitive the competition is, the more inspirational it is.

wow...i think thats my longest post, ever.

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by Alexander McGee

I am a bit bothered by your assertiveness in this matter, as well as the way you seem to address the FIRST community. We are not ignorant nor are we unintelligent, and the “world is flat” digression is a bit condescending.

There are people who do not like collaborations. Period. Read some of the posts in this thread and others, you will see. Blatantly telling them that they are wrong and need to “embrace” it is unacceptable. People are entitled to their opinions and are certainly not going to change their minds any time soon.

Alexander,

It's clear that there are people who do not support collaboration. If I may put some words in Steve's mouth for a moment, I believe his "world is flat" analogy is refering to the fact that FIRST has clearly said collaboration is here to stay. Obviously there will be people who don't like this, but what Steve is suggesting is that those who disapprove, try and accept it's presence and make the most of it.

Originally Posted by Alexander McGee

Yes, you will tell me and have that your students are inspired by what they have seen, but aren’t there better ways? I don’t pretend to know how your teams operate, and am not going to make any assumptions, but how inspired can your students be when there is spite surrounding you at the events? Everywhere I went at GLR, I heard spite about your teams and how “unfair” it was all day long. Is this really what you want?

Let me assure you our students are inspired, as they tell me on a daily basis. I'm sure this doesn't satisfy you, but they'd be glad to tell you in person if you took the time to stop by our pits. Yes, we're aware that many people were not happy with the success of our teams at the competition. I'm sure my students realized this as well. But, we were also overwhelmed by kind comments from enthusiastic mentors, students, judges and general FIRST supporters. The positive comments definitely outweighed the negative. These comments definitely inspired our students. (Granted, I'm sure most people with the negative comments chose not to come forward with them)

Yes, not everyone likes the way we operate. Should we abandon our approach, to satisfy the critics? Obviously not. Team 254 is always unfairly criticized by the FIRST community, has this stopped them? No. They keep doing their thing, inspiring thousands along the way.

This collaboration has benefited our community, our high schools, our sponsors and our students. We've been able to affect the lives of 4 times as many Niagara Region high school students. We've energized our community about FIRST. (Expect 1114's Chairman's submission to be posted in early May, which details many of these topics) Of course we don't like the spite, but it's a small toll to pay on the road to a culture change.

[Tim Delles]

Originally Posted by Alexander McGee

Yes, you will tell me and have that your students are inspired by what they have seen, but aren’t there better ways? I don’t pretend to know how your teams operate, and am not going to make any assumptions, but how inspired can your students be when there is spite surrounding you at the events? Everywhere I went at GLR, I heard spite about your teams and how “unfair” it was all day long. Is this really what you want?

Let me ask you something. How many teams out thier do people say are unfair. I can name a few that people normally say are unfair. I can name many that I have heard people say are unfair, but i'm not going to.

But heck even last year people complained about how us (229) and 217 collabrated. What exactly is unfair? I know personally, I full believe in what the Triplets are doing. It IS working for them whether or not people outside of thier teams believe it.

When I stopped by thier pit at GTR I was greeted by high school students. When I started talking to them about thier robot, it was high school students who told me. When i watched one of thier matches it was high school students cheering. Everywhere i looked around on of these 3 teams (1114, 1503, 1680) the high school students were energetically doing whatever they could to help thier team. This shows me that they were inspired. So just because people think that its unfair that they help each other out and find it easier to build 3 robots doesn't mean anything.

What is "unfair"? Isn't FIRST supposed to be about learning and inspiration? Well NiagaraFIRST has found a way to inspire students and i congratulate them on this achievement.

So my final thing to those on NiagaraFIRST. Thanks for fulfilling what FIRST is about, INSPIRATION.

Tim

[neilsonster]

Hello,

I personally don't mind collaboration in some form or another... if teams want to work together and they end up having a great time and feel inspired in some way, then the collaboration has been successful.

Now in terms of plans...

This isn't definite at all and I'm not in a leadership role on the team anymore but I know that students and other mentors on team 772 wanted to try some sort of collaboration (or it might just possibly be a mentorship) next year with a possible new team in the Windsor (Ontario) area or reviving one that only lasted through their rookie year in 2003 (they have taken part in a smaller robot competition in the few years since then).

The point is that the Windsor, ON area, along with pretty much every other area of Canada with FIRST teams outside of the GTA (the Toronto District School Board has done wonders for FIRST's growth in Canada) does not have enough knowledge of/support for FIRST, and we are trying to change that. I know for certain that there are quite a few other schools in Essex County and Windsor that have very well-equipped machine shops like Sandwich Secondary does, and Windsor is a hotbed for the auto industry in Canada. Yet there are only three (772, 773, 776) teams there. There is great potential for funding and raising awareness, and I think that partnerships with FIRST teams in this area of Ontario could definitely make it happen!

--edit--
Re: (post above mine)

Once any team gets to the competition, if they are in a position to win, why wouldn't they take it? The main difference between allying with your good friends who have an equally dominant (identical) robot and pairing up with some other team with an equally dominant (but different) robot is that you're pairing up with your friends.*edit again* - this may still be true but apparently it isn't the deciding factor in why the Niagara teams picked each other this year. (see Karthik's post below...)

I can see how it seems unfair, but it's pretty much the same situation with every #1 seed alliance that goes on to win regionals. They are generally the most dominant and it's very possible that they will fly through the elimination rounds (of course I'm not saying that this is always the case).

Personally I'd love to win a regional with some of my best friends .

[jonathan lall]

You think that post was long?

Edward Abbey once said that “growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.” I cannot accept this challenge, not just yet. Not until I'm fully convinced. I don’t dispute the fact that the institution of collaborative manufacturing and design alliances has the opportunity to lead to the creation of very impressive robots and strategy; you need only look at 1114’s – and increasingly the other Triplets’ – downright godlike performance in the last two years. I also don’t dispute the fact that FIRST has positively endorsed collaboration more than once; this has been done via documentation and also in the multitude of awards that individual teams in collaborative alliances have received (including the 2004 Chairman Award, awarded arguably for creating an ambitious collective). Furthermore, I won’t dispute for the purposes of this thread (though it is very debateable) the possibility that in some cases, teams that otherwise wouldn’t have existed do now because another team was willing to take them under its wing by doing all the thinking. I’m a huge fan of some of the team building practices and philosophies that have sprung up as a result of collaboration (take for example the “virtual team” process that Karthik mentioned), and I am consistently impressed by the sponsor enthusiasm garnered by teams in collaborative alliances. On the surface, I am all for collaboration.

But I do dispute the premise that FIRST needs to grow at any cost and as quickly as possible. Mr. Rourke points out that FIRST’s stated goals and Dean's "homework" are all about growth, and then later uses trends of collaborative alliances in the business world as evidence that such an approach is a good thing for FIRST teams, which should strive to mimic this. His position implicitly suggests to me that since FIRST’s growth is good no matter the means, and since collaborative alliances work in the business world, we should use the latter to encourage the former. I’m not so sure I can agree with this. We cannot “forever end the debate on collaboration,” certainly not so soon. Not when FIRST has been growing at a healthy rate without the help of collaborative alliances (to look at percentage growth of FIRST’s annually-increasing size and not factoring in the surrounding system is an erroneous measure), and not when what Ken Wittlief describes as potential “second rate poor cousins” have shown strikingly little team individuality and innovation thus far. JVN is absolutely right when he says that those of us weary of collaboration are weary of how collaboration is carried out procedurally. It is this I am not so sure about, because in theory, I agree almost completely with NiagaraFIRST's philosophy.

Teams are here to learn, cooperate, and indeed help each other, but whether this can apply with the same force to the design stages as it does to the competition is yet to be determined, regardless of what the teams, the Triplets, or even FIRST might tell us. I think some of us might be overlooking the value and personal satisfaction derived from using one’s own intellect to build a product, a team, and a mythology from scratch. Zan Hecht points out that one of the beautiful things about FIRST is that with an identical kit of parts, there are 1000 different solutions to a single problem, and I would add to this by saying that this is due to the individuality and diversity of the young men and women that make up each team. But if FIRST does as some might suggest (not neccesarily Mr. Rourke), the trend of collaboration will represent the biggest change to ever hit FIRST since it moved out of Manchester. I will not liken the practice of collaboration to copying the smart kid’s homework (effectively what some in this thread are doing, in addition to laughably likening it to communism, the Devil, and whatnot), because I don’t believe that is the case at all, but I do believe it has the potential to threaten team individuality and innovation if not carried out properly, and this is not something I can overlook so quickly. Specifically, I cannot endorse a ‘quantity over quality’ ethos, whether explicit or implicit.

Here’s why I say this: once a team that would not otherwise exist is brought into a collaborative alliance to get it on its feet, there are overwhelming factors and social forces that compel it to stay in that role, not the least of which might have been unwittingly outlined by JVN’s excellent analysis where he suggested that that “winning cures all.” A team that wins ‘artificially’ is a team that doesn’t want to leave. If you feed a pigeon a couple times, it becomes dependant. I’m not convinced that this is a healthy growth for FIRST, because if this does occur it will lead to a state of affairs whereein a bunch of collaborative alliances are working against each other. Mr. Rourke gave us an example of a team that is starting off in a collaborative framework (copying a design) and will eventually leave the alliance and build a robot on its own. If this is not just an exception, that is, if that team and other teams that follow do indeed consistently go out and use the success and enthusiasm gained from collaboration to propel them on their own courses, kudos to them, kudos to NiagaraFIRST, and say hello to collaboration’s biggest supporter (me!). This is what NiagaraFIRST seems to be trying to do, but it’s not like they are going to forcibly kick teams out after a certain time, is it? What about the subsequent collaborative alliances we are encouraging here? Stephen Rourke and NiagaraFIRST seem to have the very best of intentions, but that is only so much. If teams become domesticated like pigeons and collaborative alliances end up saturating the field, we will have created a monster in our haste to make FIRST grow. I just don’t think we should be in such a rush.

Right now, collaboration presents us with huge challenges never before seen. There is a quid pro quo mentality that surfaces in the playoff selection process, an implicit obligation to pick the teams in your cooperative (and therefore not other teams) when one of you seeds highly. If we look at teams as unitary actors in an anarchic FIRST system (borrowing an international relations paradigm), there is an erosion of team autonomy never before seen as more and more teams defer authority to a higher cause. There is also the potential that loyalty will trump Gracious Professionalism. This approach also presents all kinds of other problems. What does a team say about itself on its website or to judges, and how does it explain its work to parents (“yeah Mom, do you like it? We designed the wheels and we got everything else from other teams”)? Who do the judges give awards to when a great design comes up? FIRST is not as yet organized to accommodate possible side effects of collaborative alliances, and as a result, I cannot yet provide an endorsement of this solution to FIRST’s alleged growth woes. I see NiagaraFIRST as a promising and so-far successful experiment whose conclusion has not been reached, and I just am not as yet fully convinced that we've waited long enough to call others to work off its projected outcome. Perhaps next year.

Personally, I think specialization is not always a good thing, and that teams should be taking a more holistic approach from a strictly pedagogical perspective, rather than working on (and teaching students to brainstorm about) a specific part of a robot. If NiagaraFIRST and all other rookie cooperatives are a means to that end, then they are a good way to help FIRST grow. I just don't want to create 'domesticated pigeon' teams. If the concept of collaboration is only a temporary step in creating new teams that eventually fly away (okay Jon, kill the metaphor now), I’m all for it, but otherwise, I think it is growth for the sake of growth like Abbey said. We can’t add new teams to FIRST if they aren’t going to truly become new teams, because that undermines a certain element of the experience and the learning.

[RogerR]

Originally Posted by jonathan lall

You think that post was long?

Edward Abbey once said that “growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.”

well it was long for me.

i feel that as far as FIRST goes, growth for the sake of growth is a good thing. each year, thousands (millions?) of high-schoolers will graduate, and a large portion of them will never learn about 'GP', see that engineering isn't just numbers and math, or be otherwise inspired. unless they somehow get roped in during their college years they're going to miss this eye-opening experience that most of us take for granted. so be it by the triplet model (many teams, many schools), the MOE model (one team, many schools), or something else (i like Kim's idea), i think we need to grow as much as we can, as fast as we can. i want as many people as possible to experience FIRST.

personally, i've always pictured FIRST more as a virus than a cancer. we try to 'infect' who-ever we can, in an effort to destroy the current culture; the one that elevates actors, athletes, and singers as heros, with little or no respect for engineers, doctors, lawyers, etc.

hey, i can do metaphors too!!

[Karthik]

There's been a lot of talk about the triplets ganging up together at regionals. I'd like to address this claim. By no means was it a certainty that 1114 & 1503 would pick each other. I'm the lead strategist for 1114, and I have final say on our pick list. At all three regionals we went to, there was debate over who would be at the top of our list. At GLR it was a decision between 469 & 1503. In Waterloo is was 68 & 1503, and in Toronto the choice was extremely difficult between 1503, 703 & 217. Our policy on 1114 is that we pick the best team, period. At both regionals where 1114 was the #1 seed, 1503 has been the pick, and the results speak for themselves.

Now, I'm sure many of you are saying, "Well, sure they were, that's awfully convenient". For those of you who feel that way, consider the GTR in 2005. Team 1114 was the number seed, and chose Team 1305, a non triplet, while 1503 and 1680 were still available. In the second round, 1680 was still available, but we chose 1511 instead. As has been said in the past, "compete like crazy, but co-operate the rest of the time." Team 1114 will always strive to put together the best possible alliance. We spend a lot of time strategizing, collecting data and scouting. We use this information to choose our alliance partner, the decision is not based on friendships or who we collaborated with.