first FIRST conference

[Greg Needel]

I am posting this to get everyone’s thoughts on the first FIRST robotics conference..... I personally think it is a cool idea especially for teams and members who are unable to attend workshops at kick off events. I also am looking forward to seeing what the "big boys" have in store for us getting ideas from the people I really respect like Andy baker and Joe Johnson. As well as this all sounds I wonder how successful it will be because of the timing (during the day of nationals)

Either way I am looking forward to some of these seminars and I encourage you all to attend if you can.

[JVN]

I'd like to attend some of these seminars... but I'll be busy coaching 229.


Do you think the various presentations will be made available, or do I need to send someone with a videocamera?

John

Edit:
Is there anyway we can get these seminars recorded/digitized and posted somewhere? That would be uber-cool.

/Edit

[miketwalker]

I agree, I think FIRST has done a great job with planning this out. They have organized some of FIRST's finest... and I know that the seminars will be WELL worth my time. I'm very excited about getting to attend them, plus the fact that since this is the championship... you have people from all over the country/world attending so you get input from a very diverse group of people, instead of kickoff workshops which are mostly people from a general area... I think this will be great for just getting people together to talk afterwards and share ideas.

[Greg Needel]

i would hope that they would be available to the public after a resource like this will be a priceless resorce for years to come. I wonder if we could get soap to tape and post them on their site.

the problem i think i share with John is balancing my time at nationals between this and the competition

[Stephen Kowski]

like several have said I hope that there will be a video or something to show those of us that are coaching what exactly is being shown there....I would love to attend, but I believe we will participating in matches....

[KathieK]

I'm hoping to catch some of them, too. My sugestion for next year: Plan it for Wednesday and let teams know way in advance so they can decide if some team members want to travel a day ahead. RAGE will be arriving on Tuesday night this year and we have all day Wednesday free so it would have been a great time to atttend workshops.

[Jessica Boucher]

I personally think the CD webhug should be part of the official schedule, but hey, that's just me.

And could someone please tape them? We all know how FIRST is with distributing video, it's just easier if we setup a shift schedule now or if someone does them all.

[JVN]

Originally Posted by Jessica Boucher

And could someone please tape them? We all know how FIRST is with distributing video, it's just easier if we setup a shift schedule now or if someone does them all.

They are charging admission.
Is taping them even allowed?

Reviewing the schedule... there are a few I'd REALLY love to hit up.
(I'm especially interested in the "surviving as a college FIRSTer" one... sounds intriguing ) Unfortunately... I have serious team obligations.

Video?
Powerpoints?
Anything!?!?

[Jessica Boucher]

How much admission? I'd pay for someone to tape if they could promise quality footage (and if they were allowed to do so).

But all it is is meetups, roundtable discussions, and presentations, nothing more than we'd see at Kickoff...I personally don't see a problem.

[Wetzel]

If I can get there..(looking for funding for airfare/donated ticket) and it is allowed, I can find a camera and tripod and tape them and then digitize them. Or even better, Kenny Ardizzone will be hosting one. SOAP has the experiance to do this.

Admission is $5 adults, $2 students (college and high school)

Wetzel

[ngreen]

Is the registration just for they can get approximate numbers? Can you attend a session you didn't register for?

Like many of us i suspect, I have no clue what my schedule will be a nationals. I would like to attend several of the sessions but cannot gurantee anything. I would probably attend all of them given the time but would like to attend a few of them depending on how much time I have. I don't know which sessions will fall into do able time slots and don't know which session I should register for. I'm confused.

[Pierson]

I love this idea. While we are a 5th year team, many of our future team leadership will be attending a workshop or two.

Along with the other people who have already posted, I think these workshops will be a great resource for not only rookie but also veteran teams and if they were recorded, it would great.

The great thing is that they cover so many diverse topics that most anyone involved in some part of FIRST should be able to pick up new knowledge.

[Andy Baker]

Guys, this is good input. I think that we can accommodate many of these requests. Keep up the comments, and we can tackle these issues in a few days.

Andy B.

[Greg Needel]

andy,
I was wondering if any progress had been made as far as our conserns (video taping, etc) any update you could give would be helpful

Greg

[Erin Rapacki]

Participants may bring their own video camera and film a specific conference, as long as the presenter is OK with it. Because this is our first year, we will not be producing a 'master' video.