New FIRST competition structure in Michigan

[Zflash]

I couln't agree more Steve W.

"If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be.
Now put foundations under them."
Henry David Thoreau

MI you have convinced FIRST to allow you to run this ambitious "pilot" program. Perhaps you can convince them to allow the rest of the FIRST community to particapate by using the self ship method at least. Although a $1,000 less entrance fee may build a stronger foundation.

[artdutra04]

While thinking a lot about the district-level competition model and how it would effect teams, I had an idea earlier today about how it might prove to be expandable across the country, while still being a compromise solution between those teams who think more local events is the answer and the teams who believe the inspiration comes from fewer, yet larger Regionals.

The first 2-4 weeks of the competition season is local, district-level events limited to teams within 250 or so miles (actual distance varies by region). The last 3-4 weeks of the competition season is Regionals, exactly as they are structured now (free for any team to apply to). There may be an overlap of 1-2 weeks in the middle of the season.

Each portion of the country can also decide when their Regionals grow to capacity whether they would like to create a Double or Super Regional, start a new Regional, or start two district-level events. The ultimate choice should be up to the teams in that region (law of supply and demand) - let them choose/vote on what they would like most.

With a team's initial registration fee, they can choose whether they want to apply that towards two local district events or for a single regional and bypass the district-level events. Teams can only sign up for a maximum of two local events, but have no restriction on number of Regionals (other than the number of weeks in the competition season).

For regions with a lot of teams, and not enough full-scale regionals to support them, allow about 1/2 of the slots at that regional to be "open" for any team from any state to apply to. The other 1/2 is for the teams who win local district-level competitions (winning alliance, EI, and Chairman's) and receive a spot to compete at that regional.

Since none of the money paid to FIRST goes to actually supporting and running the local Regionals (who have to rely on their own sponsorship fundraising), it technically should be free for a team to compete at a district-level event and win a spot and (and compete) at its corresponding regional. However, if a team wins two district-level events, they can only use their "free" regional once, since both of the district-level events should be feeders for the same Regional.

The Championships would be structured the same as they are now: a large amount of "open" registration in the fall, with enough spots left over for the winning teams at Regionals. Winning at district-level events does not qualify a team for any spot at the Championships, however a team may use their initial registration money for two district-level events and also register for the Championships during the open registration period.

Obviously this is still an idea, and is not perfect, and is completely open for debate. But what it does do is initiate a compromise solution where everyone gives a little, yet ultimately benefits as many teams as possible.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by artdutra04

The first 2-4 weeks of the competition season is local, district-level events limited to teams within 250 or so miles (actual distance varies by region). The last 3-4 weeks of the competition season is Regionals, exactly as they are structured now (free for any team to apply to). There may be an overlap of 1-2 weeks in the middle of the season.

Each portion of the country can also decide when their Regionals grow to capacity whether they would like to create a Double or Super Regional, start a new Regional, or start two district-level events. The ultimate choice should be up to the teams in that region (law of supply and demand) - let them choose/vote on what they would like most.

Those are some good ideas.

The Michigan model took 3 regionals, converted one to the state championship (in week 6), and will have 7 district events (weeks 1-5). At a 3 into 1 ratio, that would mean if expanded continent-wide there would have to be 13 or 14 championships. It would be quite difficult to schedule all of them in week 6.

We may end up seeing some transition years until some areas of the country get enough teams to support a district/championship model. I'm not sure that choosing/voting whether or not to change is the proper concept - let's try "consensus" - but there would be some way to decide which regionals stay as traditional regionals while others convert to the district/champ format. It could be that some events could be hybrids - championships for those who advanced from districts, but also open to other teams on a open-registration basis.

Assuming, of course, that all goes well in FiM and the program will be expanded.

[IKE]

Gary is coming up with very similar numbers to what I am.

I have been doing a little analysis the last couple of days with team distribution and district model. I will post something up when it is a little more refined, but as some initial numbers to think about.
First off, driving to a local event only makes since for Mainland teams. Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and other countries may not see any easy benefit from this. They have always been special cases anyway, and would require a special solution.
1350-1500 Mainland teams would require 2700 to 3000 district slots to have 2 plays. With an average district event hosting 40 teams this would reuire 68-75 district events. Depending on goals of proximity/availability of Regional Championships there will need to be 12 to 24 Regional Championships (Similar to Michigan's State Championship). 12 would be if 50% of teams would have slots to compete, 24 would be if nearly 100% would get to compete (assuming 60 team events).
Michigan is trying the 50% of teams will get to compete in the State Championship model. Since this would correlate to 12 regional Championships, this could then turn 25 regionals into district events and would free up funding for the addition 40-50 district events require for that model. This would mean with no additional funding (and assuming funding can be dispersed) district events would need to cost 1/3 a regional event.
If nearly 100% of teams are to get to play at a regional Championship, then that will require 24 Regionals and 12 regionals will turn to district events and would require an additional 55-60 district events to be created. This will require a 1/5 regional cost for a district event.
Either model would require either a lot of new venues or, repeat events at key venues.

If FIRST (and these are all hypothetical) wants to go with 100% availability to regional championships, then it would probably be more reasonable to do 25 traditional regionals and 25 district events. If 12 regionals were turned into 25 districts, this would require districts to be 1/2 cost of a regional. It would also only require 12-15 new venues. The districts would be warm-ups, and maybe only the winners of it qualify for the Championship. At the Regionals would be the traditional 6 slots (winners, chairmans, Rookie Allstar, Engineering Inspiration?). This would then lend itself to further expansion of district events. I personally like doing 3 events and then the Championship, but this could be a reasonable 2010 interlude to gaining enough district events. With this model there are 225 qualifying positions for the Championship as opposed to 222 (6x37). This might be the way for the smoothest national transition for a district model. This model would also be more scalable for the non-North American teams that have a regional since then they could do a second district event possibly at the same venue.

Looking at the map (use http://www.usfirst.org/whatsgoingon.aspx), teams are created near events, and additional events seem to be created near teams (exceptions would be Minnesota and Oklahoma where this seems to be a simultaneous effort). Not a big surprise.

Keys to success for this kind of expansion would seem to be:
Cost structure: Is 1/5 and/or 1/3 and/or 1/2 even reasonable (from the number I have heard, I think 1/3 is reasonable and 1/5 may be doable).
Venues: I think that smaller universities with engineering programs benefit from this. If they can donate gym space, this could work. I know that Wayne State, Eastern Michigan, Kettering, and Grand Valley get a lot of attention from our students. I have found several engineering schools that have great programs but don't get the coverage that some of the big schools do.
Location, location, location: If these venues can align with strategic locations between current venues, other areas of the country may see growth like the upper Midwest and East/West coast have seen. Part of why there are so many teams in Michigan (esp. SE Michigan) is that you don't need to stay overnight to go to every regional. Having at least 1 event that is a reasonable drive from home is a huge benefit from a cost structure. New Englanders know this, CA knows this.

We may need to return to Dean's previous assignment and instead of creating teams at Colleges and Universities, Bring in the Dean's of Engineering and say, how would you like 600 motivated interested local students visit your University every spring right before they apply for College's. Would that be worh a weekend at your Co-Rec or fieldhouse?

$0.02 more cents for the pot.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Steve W

I believe that Michigan teams that compete at their state championship should not be allowed to compete at any other regionals. If however they do not attend the state championship I see no reason that they cannot compete at other regionals.

One minor detail there... MI championship is Week 6. Teams might not know if they are going until Week 5. They might have already paid for one regional outside MI in Week 2 and attended.

That is a good point, but it'll be kind of hard to enforce.

[Steve W]

Originally Posted by EricH

One minor detail there... MI championship is Week 6. Teams might not know if they are going until Week 5. They might have already paid for one regional outside MI in Week 2 and attended.

That is a good point, but it'll be kind of hard to enforce.

Not really. If they sign up for another regional then they cannot compete at the Michigan Championships. If they sign up for Michigan Championships then they cannot compete elsewhere. Easy !!

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Steve W

Not really. If they sign up for another regional then they cannot compete at the Michigan Championships. If they sign up for Michigan Championships then they cannot compete elsewhere. Easy !!

The first one, yes, that is easy. The second one is not as easy, for the reasons above (and the fact that registration for said event starts around Week 5).

[chinckley]

How many teams are going to be allowed into each district event?
It seems that there are about 25 in most of the events now. Has anyone calculated the average time between matches? It looks like it will be very quick turnarounds.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by chinckley

How many teams are going to be allowed into each district event?

The number I heard was somewhere around 40. That may vary by location if there are physical limitations at the site. For instance, this means Wayne State would have to add 6-8 teams more than they have had in previous years. But since they wouldn't have to store shipping crates, the pit area could be expanded into the walled-off section east of last year's pits, part of the snack bar area.

Total capacity would be about 140 teams. There are currently 93 teams signed up.

It seems that there are about 25 in most of the events now. Has anyone calculated the average time between matches? It looks like it will be very quick turnarounds.

24 teams, assuming 2 3-team alliances, would require less than 4-match cycles (else the same 6 teams would always be in every 4th match). For 40 teams, you could theoretically average about 6 match cycles, but the program would most likely have to be set for a 3-match or 4-match minimum turnaround time. 12 matches per team on a 8-minute match cycle would take 10-2/3 hours total time to run matches - about 8 hours on Friday and 3 hours on Saturday morning? Certainly attainable.

[M. Gildner]

This was a good move. Travel costs were too expensive

[Mike Schreiber]

Originally Posted by dtk

The top 3 Chairman's and Woodie Flowers award submissions from the state championship will move on to the championship pool. So there will be the same number of Michigan submissions as last year.

I'm not sure if anyone else has brought up this point as I haven't read all 200 some posts but I didn't see much discussion of Chairman's...

In order for your community efforts to be rewarded you have to have a viable robot able to get you to the State Championship? Since when?

Does anyone else question the reasoning here?

I understand the need for the simplification, as a Chairman's submission at every district is not a possibility, but are only teams who have competitive robots able to get them to the championship allowed to make their chairman's presentation? There has been no correlation between the two in the past. Yes, teams that win the Chairman's award generally are experienced and a great force to be reckoned with on the field, but that is not necessarily the case, and every team has their off year for the robot...

To me the Woodie Flowers submission is even more of a necessity for district competitions. Mentors who win this award aren't necessarily from highly experienced or strongly competitive teams and deserving mentors' teams may not make it to the championship. Are we tossing them aside because there team wasn't good enough? Are all of the submissions statewide judged regardless of whether or not the team is attending?

I know the district system isn't perfect and our criticisms won't have the blessing of foresight until summer but I guess we'll see how this ends up. I simply hope no deserving team or mentor is passed up because they did not have an amazing robot.

[Paul Copioli]

The actual rule for the Woodie Flowers Finalist Award for Michigan (I do not know why it is not in the manual yet as several sections for the WFA are missing) has nothing to do with the robot performance.

Basically, you nominate your candidate at one of the Michigan districts you will be attending. At each district, all of the nominated candidates from that district will be called to the playing field to be recognized as nominees.

All of the nominees from all of the districts will be judged for the Michigan State Championship WFFA. There will be 1 WFFA winner from Michigan, not 3. I will not go into the reasons why on this forum. If you really want to know why, then you can discuss it with me during the 2009 season. However, all of the former WFA (it was unanimous) agreed that this was the best approach for Michigan and FIRST.

Agian, it has nothing to do with the robot for the WFFA, including Michigan.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by ICanCountTo19

In order for your community efforts to be rewarded you have to have a viable robot able to get you to the State Championship? Since when?

No. The current plan has a separate category of awards called "FIRST Culture Transforming Awards", which includes Chairman's, Rookie, EI, Woodie Flowers Finalists, Enterpreneurship and Autodesk Visualization. Winners of these awards at Districts will advance to State without their robot. (Unless the robot also qualifies by scores.) The teams will be judged separately at State for advancement to Atlanta: 3 State Chairman's, 1 State EI, 2 State Rookies, 3 WFFA's.

The whole thing will be similar to how the WFFA worked in the past. Regional WFFA's advanced to Atlanta, whether or not their team qualified.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

No. The current plan has a separate category of awards called "FIRST Culture Transforming Awards", which includes Chairman's, Rookie, EI, Woodie Flowers Finalists, Enterpreneurship and Autodesk Visualization. Winners of these awards at Districts will advance to State without their robot. (Unless the robot also qualifies by scores.) The teams will be judged separately at State for advancement to Atlanta: 3 State Chairman's, 1 State EI, 2 State Rookies, 3 WFFA's.

The whole thing will be similar to how the WFFA worked in the past. Regional WFFA's advanced to Atlanta, whether or not their team qualified.

Must teams that are judged, sans robot, for "culture transforming" awards pay registration for the state event? I hope not.

I guess the days where a Chairman's Award submission and presentation are made by members of my robotics team is coming to an end and, instead, I need to start treating that group as a separate organization. I can't, after all, bring 40 kids to an event wherein only 3 of them will present to judges for ten minutes and then have absolutely nothing to do for the rest of event.

My kids were thrilled to win RCA last season and the best part about that for any of our mentors was watching and being there with them as they went out onto the field. I think that moment might lose some of its impact when I have to leave 90% of my team at home because they weren't involved in our entry.

[Craig Roys]

Originally Posted by Madison

I guess the days where a Chairman's Award submission and presentation are made by members of my robotics team is coming to an end and, instead, I need to start treating that group as a separate organization. I can't, after all, bring 40 kids to an event wherein only 3 of them will present to judges for ten minutes and then have absolutely nothing to do for the rest of event.

My kids were thrilled to win RCA last season and the best part about that for any of our mentors was watching and being there with them as they went out onto the field. I think that moment might lose some of its impact when I have to leave 90% of my team at home because they weren't involved in our entry.

Three things:

First:
Why can't you take 40 kids when only three are presenting? I think it would be a wonderful show of team unity if the the entire team were to be present to support the CA presentation team. As a coach, I would be pretty upset if my team didn't want to go the the competition even though we weren't competing. Given that CA is the most prestigious award, my team would be going - robot or no robot.

Second:
As to the "nothing to do", why not have them volunteer for the competition or help out other teams or watch a fun competition w/out the stress (albeit fun stress ) of competing?

Third:
I believe that any team that is organized enough to win a District Level Chairman's Award would also manage to be one of the over 50% of MI teams who qualify for State's. If they're not, see first point above...