Georgia Districts

[Anupam Goli]

From an email I received today:

GeorgiaFIRST Robotics is in the process of gathering information to make a decision in regard to our structure of play for the 2016 season. We are asking for your input to help us make this decision. Please read the information below and click Going District Survey to complete the survey no later than April 20, 2015. Thank you in advance for your participation.

Current competition structure in Georgia: Regional Model
FRC teams pay: $5,000 for a veteran team and $6,000 for a rookie team
They receive: A kit-of-parts and entrance into one regional event (45 or 66 team event)
Additional regional events: $4,000
Seeding Matches per regional event (mandatory one event): 8-10 matches

Competition structure being considered in Georgia: District Model
FRC teams pay: $5,000 for a veteran team and $6,000 for a rookie team
The team receives: A kit-of-parts and entrance into two district events (30-40 team events average)
Additional district event (3rd ): $1,000 (Optional)
State Championship event: $4,000
Seeding Matches per team playing two district events (mandatory two events): 24 matches

• Two opportunities to compete and advance to the district (state) championship
• Opportunity to evolve robot design/fix technical issues
• Reduce travel time and cost/shorter event structure
• Better opportunity for family and friends to attend an event

District Events are usually two-day events and the district (state) championship is a three-day event.
Bag and tag implemented within both models.
No difference in types/categories of awards/medals.
All teams within our district qualifying to attend the FIRST World Championship would be from Georgia.
Number of teams qualifying to attend FIRST World Championships would be based on number of teams within the
state. (Example: Indiana currently has 49 FRC teams, 3 district events (30-34 team average), 1 state event (30
teams) and they qualified 10 Indiana teams to attend FIRST World Championship).

You are required to compete at two district events within our state to earn enough qualifying points to advance to the district (state) championship event. You are only allowed to play at a third event out-of-state or within state if capacity is available. A third play does not count in terms of qualifying points. Average cost of a third play is $1,000.

Thank you for taking the time to give us your thoughts. Watch for additional information as it becomes available at gafirst.org.

GeorgiaFIRST Robotics

FIRST's site lists 75 teams in Georgia. We'd likely have 4-5 district events and maybe a 40 team championship. I'd like to see us send 12-15 teams to championships with this new model.

Also I'm glad we are finally trying to ditch the 65+ team regional model. I was not at all happy with the number of matches we got, and this district model would fix all of those issues.

Thoughts?

[ehoyla]

After seeing how big Peachtree was this year and how few matches each team got to play, I like it.

[robochick1319]

As a South Carolina team with rapidly decreasing regional options, I don't like the idea of losing two regionals. But it could be very good for Georgia.

Any idea of when Georgia may move to this model?

[Anupam Goli]

Originally Posted by robochick1319

As a South Carolina team with rapidly decreasing regional options, I don't like the idea of losing two regionals. But it could be very good for Georgia.

Any idea of when Georgia may move to this model?

The survey said the move is happening in the next two years. They're strongly pushing to move next year though. I'd personally like to have a district with South Carolina, since our regionals have a lot of overlap in terms of teams. From what I've heard, North Carolina is almost dead set on going to districts next year as well.

[robochick1319]

Originally Posted by Anupam Goli

The survey said the move is happening in the next two years. They're strongly pushing to move next year though. I'd personally like to have a district with South Carolina, since our regionals have a lot of overlap in terms of teams. From what I've heard, North Carolina is almost dead set on going to districts next year as well.

Yes, that would be good. I have this fear that NC and GA will move to Districts and somehow SC will get left behind. I don't think we're big enough for a SC district but it could make sense to lump a couple states together for a Southeast District.

[Anupam Goli]

An Alabama Regional seems to be in the works, but it would be weird if the only options for south carolina teams would be an overcrowded Palmetto Regional, a growing Smoky Mountain Regional, or hop over one state to Alabama. Ideally we'd have SC and NC or GA and SC combine into one district. I'd wager Tennessee and Alabama would both take a while to form districts, and Tennessee would likely split and join up with an established system or have its own district due to the size of its state.

[ehoyla]

They announced at the Smoky Mountains Regional that there will be an Alabama Regional next year.

[Tim Sharp]

It's official, the Rocket City Regional will be held in Huntsville, AL next year. Time and location TBD.

[jman4747]

I am in support of GA districts and it's great to hear AL getting a regional now too. With Palmetto, GSC, and Peachtree full this was something I expected soon.

[Zflash]

First off congrats GA for reaching district potential. We will miss competing with you all if things go this way however districts are rather appealing and that is where it is at.

Somewhat off topic I would like to suggest the following....

F.I.S.
FIRST In the South

South Carolina:37
North Carolina:42
Georgia:49
Tennessee:38
West Virginia:4
Virginia:69
Kentucky:12

Total of 251 teams.

You could easily have 12 district events and 1 district championship and qualify far more teams. After a year or two of team growth you could break this large district into smaller ones potentially having one district for each state at some point.

Low registration fees for all, more matches for all, and lower travel costs for most.

[dodar]

Originally Posted by Zflash

First off congrats GA for reaching district potential. We will miss competing with you all if things go this way however districts are rather appealing and that is where it is at.

Somewhat off topic I would like to suggest the following....

F.I.S.
FIRST In the South

South Carolina:37
North Carolina:42
Georgia:49
Tennessee:38
West Virginia:4
Virginia:69
Kentucky:12

Total of 251 teams.

You could easily have 12 district events and 1 district championship and qualify far more teams. After a year or two of team growth you could break this large district into smaller ones potentially having one district for each state at some point.

Low registration fees for all, more matches for all, and lower travel costs for most.

Florida?

[Zflash]

Originally Posted by dodar

Florida?

Why Not?

[Nathan Streeter]

Glad to hear Districts will be coming to the Southeast US in the next year or two! It's a huge improvement to the regional model, imho! You can really see it helping out FIRST teams throughout New England... many teams, young and old, had become stagnant and just hadn't been as productive... now you see many teams really thriving (again)!

My suggestion would be to try to create Districts larger than a single state... while Indiana has definitely proved you can do it with a ~40-50 team state, I think the dynamic really works best when you have ~80-150+ teams. That's large enough to really get the benefit of playing with teams at the DCMP you haven't competed with before, and to create a big group of teams with a strong sense of solidarity.

While the 'Super Southest Region' of everyone south of the Mason-Dixon and east of the Mississippi seems a little unreasonable for a District CMP, I think having 3 or 4 districts that encompass this region would probably be a reasonable number. Obviously if Districts got well above 250 teams or so, they may want to start splitting apart... but then again Michigan seems to be doing well with its 350 team district!

Seems like the 'cores' of some potential Districts in the SE could be:

- Virginia & Maryland
- Georgia & South Carolina
- Florida?
- Tennessee?

- West Verginia would most likely join with Virginia and Maryland (but could perhaps join an Ohio & Western PA district).
- North Carolina could probably join with either Virginia and Maryland or with Georgia and South Carolina.
- Florida could potentially become it's own district, but joining with Georgia and South Carolina would also make some sense (more so if NC were to join VA and MD)
- Alabama would probably join with Georgia and South Carolina, although with plans to host their own Regional in 2016, that would seem to push that timeline out to at least 2017.
- Kentucky could form a smaller district (~50 teams) with Tennessee, or perhaps try joining with TN, VA, WV, and MD for a large district of >200 teams... although spread out across a larger and longer area than the PNW.

A Possible Set of Combinations:

- Capital Region: Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia, North Carolina and Washington DC

- 178 Teams (in 2015)
- 133,300 sq mi

- Southeast Region: Georgia, South Carolina, Florida, and Alabama

- 175 Teams (in 2015)
- 209,700 sq mi

- 'Central' Region: Tennessee and Kentucky

- 57 Teams (in 2015)
- 82,600 sq mi

- Mississippi River Region: Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi

- 54 Teams (in 2015)
- 153,500 sq mi

[Alex2614]

Originally Posted by Nathan Streeter

- West Verginia would most likely join with Virginia and Maryland (but could perhaps join an Ohio & Western PA district).

Current plan is for West Virginia to be joining Ohio and western Pennsylvania when they form their district. And the plan is for 2017 las I heard. This actually makes much more sense than Virginia geographically. I hope that eventually western MD could join us, though.

[Billfred]

Hate to see a solid event like Peachtree come off the board, but congrats to our neighbors for seeing the growth to make districts viable. After three years of 60-some-odd-team regionals, I know I can't wait for the change either.

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For those that keep asking about South Carolina: I've talked with Frank Lanford (the Palmetto RD) about this one at length. There has been no down-to-brass-tacks talk about us playing in any district system next year, either alone or as a multi-state region. Judging from how Indiana pulled it off and from our neighbors, my bet is on a one-state district around 2017-2018 once our team count gets north of 50. (We were at 41 this year, Indiana had 49.) The other Good Guy Frank wouldn't flip the switch without plenty of dialogue first.