Multiple program events held at the same time

[KathieK]

The following quote from the thread on the NYC Regional prompted the creation of this thread:

Originally Posted by galewind :To be critical, the biggest issue for me at the NY regional is the sound. When I'm on the field, I'm fighting over being able to hear the Emcees and being blasted over by the FTC area and FRC pit area. I'm not sure if its the same in the stands, but it really makes my job harder when I hear the field error sound to realize it's on FTC and not FRC.

On the FTC side, we couldn't hear due to the overwhelming noise from the FRC fields. I had a mentor come up and ask that we turn down the music because he couldn't hear our announcements - but it was coming from the FRC side. Once that game's play was finished for the day, we all went AHHHH, it's finally QUIET over here! We turned on our own music, our emcees got to be heard, and we continued with our event.

Everyone knows from our Hartford experience two years ago I'm not a fan of combining program events. There is little to no crossover between programs (how many FRC people came to check out the FTC event? How many FTCers went to the FRC event? Do spectators check out all the events or just the one that they might be connected with?) I think the programs end up competing with each other instead of complimenting each other. So what's the point of doing them at the same time?

While it's great to show off demos of each program at each tournament, I wonder how many people actually go up and ask about the programs? From my experience, so few people stopped and looked at the FRC bot and FLL demo at my FVC event last year that I didn't showcase them at my FTC event this year. We did have our FIRST booth up with static displays of the programs at them and information about FIRST and all the programs available.

What do you think? Should different program events be combined? If yes, why? If not, why not?