A Request for transparency from FIRST

[DonRotolo]

Several mentors collaborated on this letter, which was sent to FIRST by mail on 23 September.

23 September 2009

Mr. Steve R. Chism,
Vice President, Programs
FIRST
200 Bedford St
Manchester, NH 03101


Dear Mr. Chism,

We are writing to you today as a group of concerned mentors. As professionals and businesspeople, we are used to and have come to expect that any professional organization with which we are associated will generally have a future vision, a structured long-range plan that helps guide their associates towards a common goal.

The idea of a “five year plan” is not new, and nearly any organization of merit has one or something similar. However, we do not find this to be true or apparent with FIRST. Without a clearly communicated general plan for the future some of us have wasted efforts towards goals which – not long after being implemented – were nullified by some action by FIRST. Here are three recent examples:

o Switch from FVC to FTC. Several teams/schools invested in VEX kits, the switch damaged credibility with those whom we are trying to impact as per our homework assignment.
o Switch in FRC controller. The financial implications would have improved had planning been forecast to teams in advance
o District model implementation plans

We’re not complaining about these actions but about the lack of transparency in their planning phases. While it is reasonable to be without a “fully fleshed out” plan yet – particularly for the District model – surely some of the basics are known, and uncertain or speculative points can be identified as such. We certainly all know that plans can change and we can work with that.

Should FIRST desire, we happily and enthusiastically volunteer to assist with any part of the planning efforts of FIRST, both short term and long term. We're here to support you. The organization will get a lot further if we all work towards a known goal than if we pull in different directions.

We, therefore, respectfully request that FIRST publish a publicly available future plan, laying out for the volunteers and supporters FIRST’s vision of the future. Not wanting to restrict or limit your response, we leave it up to you to determine – hopefully in collaboration with skilled and sincere volunteers – what kind of document might fulfill this need.

Respectfully submitted,


Andy Baker, Team 45, 13 years
Arefin Bari, Teams 1345, 108, 9 years
John Boucher, Team 237, 6 years
Wayne Cokeley, Team 25, 12 years
Arthur Dutra, Team 228, 6 years
Kim O’Toole Eckhardt, Team 1511, 14 years
Patrick Fairbank, Team 1503, 9 years
Ryan Foley, Team 1995, 9 years
Chris Fultz, Team 234, 9 years
Collin Fultz, Teams 234, 1747, 8 years
Adam Heard, Team 973, 6 years
Dana P. Henry, Team 839, 8 years
Travis Hoffman, Team 48, 10 years
Kevin Kolodziej, Team 1675, 12 years
Mark Kramarczyk, Teams 1189, 3096, 4 years
Rich Kressly, Team 1712, 9 years
Billfred Leverette, Teams 2815, 1398, 1618, 6 years
Shawn T. Lim, Team 1310, 11 years
Cory McBride, Team 254, 9 years
Mark McLeod, team 358, 8 years
Jon Mittelman, Team 236, 9 years
Justin Montois, Team 340, 5 years
Meredith Novak, Team 16, 8 years
Bharat Nain, Team 25, 7 years
Raul Olivera, Team 111, 14 years
Ken Patton, Team 65, 13 years
Ricky Quinones, Team 269, 8 years
Bryan T. Ragaini, Team 228, 11 years
Donald Rotolo, Team 1676, 5 years
Ed Sparks, Team 34, 14 years
Beth Sweet, Formerly Teams 67, 1504, 7 years
Gary Voshol, Formerly Teams 1188, 1025, 9 years
Richard Wallace, Team 931, 8 years
Steve Warren, Team 188, 7 years
Jane Young, Team 418, 7 years

cc: Paul R. Gudonis, President
Bill Miller, Director FRC
Ken Johnson, Director FTC
Anna Maenhout, Director FLL & JFLL

[Andrew Schreiber]

Don, allow me to be the first to say THANK YOU!

EDIT: For reference, the mentors there make up over 350 years of FIRST experience.

[James Tonthat]

A second thank you. This needed to be done.

[rtfgnow]

It's hard for FIRST not to listen when the signatures are longer than the letter. Thank you to all involved.

[Akash Rastogi]

I feel content knowing that these mentors have our best interests at heart. Thank you.

[Jack Jones]

I can’t help but see the irony in a request for transparency that was drafted, apparently in secret, by a group of thirty-five among thousands. Once again it proves to me that transparency is overrated. Last year a major complaint against FiM was the so-called lack of transparency. It was as if a gang of us went behind their backs, when, in reality, the only to way to affect change without creating chaos was to limit the number of seats at the table. The same is true for this effort, which is why I am disappointed that they chose to make it public. In my opinion, this is not the time nor place for everyone to add their two cents.

That said; I wish the gang of thirty-five well in negotiating their five year plan. My only hope is that you do not try to get it done by petitioning the majority of us who exist from day to day on issues such as these.

[Akash Rastogi]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

by a group of thirty-five among thousands. .

If these 35 don't represent the opinions and ideals of majority of the FIRST community...then I don't know who does...

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

I can’t help but see the irony in a request for transparency that was drafted, apparently in secret, by a group of thirty-five among thousands. Once again it proves to me that transparency is overrated.

Do you agree or disagree with what they are asking for? If you agree say so, if not say so and explain why.

[Schnabel]

I feel that this letter cuts to the point, and does the job of requesting, not demanding, well. Make sure to keep us informed!

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

It was as if a gang of us went behind their backs, when, in reality, the only to way to affect change without creating chaos was to limit the number of seats at the table. The same is true for this effort, which is why I am disappointed that they chose to make it public.

I have been involved in this sort of thing before, so let me share what I have learned.

1) Essentially the few are trying to represent the thousands of people who are involved, wouldn't the few want the thousands to have their backs? Especially when dealing with those who lead the thousands? I felt so, and usually I would be proven wrong about what the majority opinion was, even after starting to take action. This would usually lead to returning the issue at hand back to normal.

2)Those who are being asked to change will retaliate one way or another. When I am the one being asked to change, I would react differently if a majority felt the same way, and not just a few. Statements such as this must be made public in order to get a feel as to what the majority opinion is. Sure you have the few that feel one way, but when a statement is made public, and a general consensus can be determined, something should be done. This may be the difference between this letter being tossed to the side, or being brought up for consideration.

3)When you start to make something like this public, keep the public updated. This again goes with having the backs of the few. If the thousands do not know what's new, how can they support it?

Just remember, public opinion on a forum like this is not the decision making tool. This thread is just as lethal as any design your own game thread.

[Cory]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

That said; I wish the gang of thirty-five well in negotiating their five year plan. My only hope is that you do not try to get it done by petitioning the majority of us who exist from day to day on issues such as these.

I don't see what your point is here. The intent of this letter was not for a small group of select people to attempt to influence FIRST policy. It was for a representative group of mentors with a lot of experience in FRC to voice their concern that the ship seems to be sailing without a plotted course, so to speak. Maybe FIRST will respond and publish (to everyone, not just this small subset of people) what their vision is for the next 5-10 years and how they plan to get there.

I really don't see how you can be opposed to this.

[Alan Anderson]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

I can’t help but see the irony in a request for transparency that was drafted, apparently in secret, by a group of thirty-five among thousands.

It wasn't in secret. It just wasn't in public.

Only those 35 people affixed their names to the letter. Many more have been involved in the discussions about what we as team members "deserve" to know about FIRST's plans for the future.

Once again it proves to me that transparency is overrated.

"Once again"? What previous events are you thinking of?

It was as if a gang of us went behind their backs, when, in reality, the only to way to affect change without creating chaos was to limit the number of seats at the table. The same is true for this effort, which is why I am disappointed that they chose to make it public. In my opinion, this is not the time nor place (as JVN once put it) ‘for everyone to put their stink on it.’

That sounds inconsistent. Was "limit the number of seats" to "thirty-five among thousands" a good thing or a bad thing, in your view?

Would you have preferred that this letter remain unpublished? Would you have wanted it to remain unsent? I don't understand what your point is.

[yodameister]

Even though this is only my 5th year in FIRST, I could not agree more that we need open lines of communication. I have been in education for over a decade now and every school has a plan for the future and most times the teachers are involved in that process in some way or another.

I wish I could have been involved in this letter as I definitely would have put my name to it, and agree with its contents. I have always wanted to be able to give my input to FIRST and if asked, would eagerly do so.

[DonRotolo]

Originally Posted by Jack Jones

My only hope is that you do not try to get it done by petitioning the majority of us who exist from day to day on issues such as these.

I'm sorry, but I simply do not understand what you mean.

Originally Posted by Schnabel

Make sure to keep us informed!

Absolutely!

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

It wasn't in secret. It just wasn't in public.

Thank you Alan.

Originally Posted by yodameister

I wish I could have been involved in this letter as I definitely would have put my name to it, and agree with its contents. I have always wanted to be able to give my input to FIRST and if asked, would eagerly do so.

I truly regret that logistics and timing simply did not allow for the input from the "thousands"; however I feel that additional input would not have changed the message or it's impact significantly.

Anyone who feels strongly about it is encouraged to share their comments with their FIRST Regional contact.

[,4lex S.]

Thank you for putting your time into this guys. I think this pretty much sums up most of my concerns with FIRST today, and I am glad such an experienced group came together to point this out to the directorship.

The magic curtain they hide the game behind every year should not extend to the overall goals of the organization. It seems almost like blindfolding everyone and then trying to get them to solve the problems we are trying to solve. This never seemed very efficient.

[Jack Jones]

It appears that some have misunderstood my previous post.
You may take exception to a snippet here and snippet there, but if you consider it in total, I believe you will grasp my meaning – which was:

Transparency isn’t always necessary.
Transparency isn’t always possible.
The issues raised are best resolved between the ones who raised them and the management and board of directors.
It serves no purpose to debate those issues here, where rumor will abound and there’s sure to be false assumptions as to how and why decisions have been made.

OAO