Qualification for Disney in 2003

[purplehaze357]

bigger than disney , somehow i dont see that happening in the near future but there is no better solution as of yet. I think FIRST is growing too large for disney but i am opposed to the even/odd system because it limits the teams that can go regardless of whether they earned their way, have been involved since the begining or otherwise, you still are limiting the number of teams. FIRST has to come up with a solution.

Heres a suggestion that i have been sitting on for a little while. Let me kno what you think.

Instead of holding the whole national event in Disney and holding it in four different arenas hold the different divisions in different locations kinda like the NCAA tournamemnt holds theirs in different sections and the winners go to Disney. Now i kno that some people are going to say well that defeats the whole purpose of the national event but not really if you think about it because it just gives you more inscentive and it makes the already competitve nautre of the compettion even more competitive.

Like i said its just a suggestion and it may sound a little biast but it is not meant to be so. I love this experience and i want to be involved for awhile, I would hate to see it go downhill because it grew to large. We need to grow, yes, but people need to start growing with us. Maybe Dean will just have to talk to his people down Disney and get us more room. I have no idea but what i do know is that we need to figure something out and we need to do it quick.

Let me know what you think...

[Amy Beth]

Sorry, i didn't mean to step on anyone's toes. See, when my team started doing FIRST five years ago, there were no regionals east of detroit. We had neither time nor money to go to a regional, so we went straight to nationals totally unprepared and overwhelmed. There were so many teams there that we knew them only by their buttons. Finally, a couple of years ago they started a west coast regional and it felt like my eyes were opened. Finally, there was time to slow down and actually meet people and talk to them. It was overall a much more positive experience. So...maybe this is just me, but i look forward far more to the regionals than to Disney because i know that i will know peple there, and i will actually get to compete with everyone there. In the regionals, i feel like my little christian school actually has a chance against everyone else. I guess, then, i just wish other people could have as positive experience as me.
Sorry.

[AdamT]

Agreed...

I do look forward to regionals, but I find regionals just as fast-paced and stressful as the national competition. That could be due to going to a regional with 66 teams ...

Oddly enough, I have found that I meet more FIRST people through the net or at Nationals then I do at regionals.

This whole issue is frustrating because everyone wants to see all the robots and meet everyone (at least some of us do). So the only options are to make Nationals bigger, split it up, or limit Nationals....Personaly, i tend to lean towarards making Nationals bigger some how or to limit it....

[rees2001]

Relax, it will all get worked out. Comming from the Northeast (ny) where there are a ton of choices for regionals, regional dosen't seem like as big of a deal. Every year we have attended a different regional, its cool but not nats. For those of you who have been to nats, remember the chills you got when you pulled up to epcot & saw the SIZE of nats. Awesome, everybody should get the oppertunity.

That being said, for a average funded team (us) there is alot that goes into planning for the nats. Our first year we scrounged money & sent a small team after doing well in NJ. You just can't send your team after winning a qualifying event.

Furthermore it is wrong to base nats on # & past year awards. As you can read in other threads judges make mistakes. We would already be just about qualified for next year if it weren't for a ref's miss-scoreing. It puts to much pressure on success & that's not what FIRST is all baout.

[Nate Smith]

Originally posted by rees2001
Furthermore it is wrong to base nats on # & past year awards. As you can read in other threads judges make mistakes. We would already be just about qualified for next year if it weren't for a ref's miss-scoreing. It puts to much pressure on success & that's not what FIRST is all baout.

While in your opinion, it may be "wrong" to base national qualifying on previous years or team #, this was actually a solution presented by some of the teams at the team forums in August. Looking at this year's competition, you can actually see why...there are some teams that, due to the increased costs of booking for nationals at the last minute, are not able to attend event though they have qualified at an event this year. Rather than make this an issue for EVERY team who attends, FIRST has implemented, at the suggestion of the teams, a system where a large number of the teams know well in advance that they are attending, and can do the necessary financial planning well in advance.

[Perseus]

Furthermore it is wrong to base nats on # & past year awards. As you can read in other threads judges make mistakes. We would already be just about qualified for next year if it weren't for a ref's miss-scoreing. It puts to much pressure on success & that's not what FIRST is all baout.

How else do you propose FIRST does it? Like Nate said, its not really logical to tell a team 2 weeks before nationals that they are qualified. It is hard enough to get bookings at Disney when you try 2 months in advance. I think that using a points system and then alternating from odd and even numbered teams is fine way to qualify. I know your side of the arguement: that if you have a great bot this year but your robot lacked last year, why should you be disallowed to compete at Nationals. The solution: I believe that FIRST does allow some teams to qualify based on their current year robots if they are exceptionally good but I would verify that with someone else

[Ben Mitchell]

No offense to those of you on rookie teams, but you don't need to go to the nationals. Enjoy your regional. Get a feel for how the competition works. And if you manage to do well one year, then you'll get to compete against everyone else the next year. Amy Ross
Student leader of team relations
Team #330, Beach'Bot
~Learn, Serve, Compete

I agree with you 100%.

When clueless/inexperianced teams lower the scores of good machines, everyone loses.

Now, is FIRST about teaching/inspiring people about technology??

Or is it about making everyone "feel good"?

We don't want FIRST to become like Public Schools, do we? Its a COMPETITION, meaning that good machines should be rewarded, and those that dont do as well should strive to do better next year.

(Whoa, Im going to make people upset with this one)


--Ben Mitchell

[Anthony S.]

originally posted by Ben Mitchell:
When clueless/inexperianced teams lower the scores of good machines, everyone loses.
(Whoa, Im going to make people upset with this one)

You probably will make some people upset with this one, I'm not upset though(maybe because I'm not a rookie team ) but I disagree 100%. I think it would be an awesome experience to be able to attend a nationals, especially your rookie year, it gives you something to look forward to, though my team wasn't a rookie team last year, I was a rookie, and I really enjoyed nationals and look forward to it this year and I hate that I may miss it next year because of the new system. But like I've heard many FIRST speakers say "Everyone is a winner in FIRST". So I really don't think winning the competition is THAT important, sure it would be really cool to win a competition, but I think its just as fun to be involved in FIRST and attending the event.

[Ben Mitchell]

Although we all like that...


If your not playing to win, why are you playing? The idea behind FIRST is that a superior machine (engineering) will inspire people to better their own robots, much like imporvments to modern technology.

What are the benefits of having an awesome team and robot if the Nationals, the highlight of the season, are open to anybody?

I think the Nationals should be a priviledge for the teams that proved they have excellent machines, and have their act together. Having lots of rookies is great, but in my experiance, they just dont have, through no fault of their own, the experiance that veteran teams do, and on average (AVERAGE) their designs are more modes, and their dont exactly...sweep the competition off its feet.

The nationals, I feel, would be more exciting if the matches were among equals, that is, the top tier of teams (the nats could be multi-tiered to include everyone).

Of course, everyone is a winner in FIRST, but what's the point of putting so much time and effort into a winning team if anyone can walk into the National Championships?

--Im truly, honestly, not trying to bash rookies out there, but from experiance, poor-preforming robots drag other teams down, and that, i feel, is the worst sort of punishment a team could go through--all that work, all the $$$, and nothing to show for it except 30-something place out of 80 teams, when a team preformed excellently at a regional.

Sorry, but once again, is FIRST that "everyone is a winner"

or is FIRST teaching them to constantly strive to better themselves, and to work hard to make it in the world?

I think the message is the latter. Utopian philosophy does'nt work outside of a classroom.

--Ben Mitchell

[Christine G.]

When clueless/inexperianced teams lower the scores of good machines, everyone loses.

How are the rookie teams suppose to learn if they do not get to see the the more experienced teams up close and personal?

Yes, they could see some local experienced teams at a regional but there are so many more ways to build a great robot that I feel they should be at the nationals.

Besides just because a non rookie team has a great robot one year does not mean they will have a great robot the next year. Team members and engineers do sometimes change from year to year as does the game.

[Joe Matt]

Nats should be open to all rokie teams and the best of last year. All others will have to deal with the odd/even thing. Rokies get a "free" pass, where they can go whenever they want, let it be the first year or 10 years latter. Then teams that did well the previous year can go to the Nats.

[Wayne C.]

Try this idea-

FIRST develops 40 regionals across the world- spaced as uniformly as possible in time and distance so people can reasonably get to them. With 20 now that is not too far off.

With alliances of 3, the winners and finalists get to go to the nationals at Epcot = 6x40=240

All of the Chairman's Awards people get to go= 20 (someday)

The remaining slots are filled by teams winning awards OF ANY TYPE during the season. No awards count more than others. This would work by having all teams getting put on a list according to when they first register- first come, first served. At the end of the season the awards are tallied and pointed and the list of invites would consist of teams who won multiple awards first and also registered for FIRST first. Overflow positions are offered further and further down the list until all are filled. I figure we are looking at about 400 teams here, not all of which will make it.

Would this knock out rookies?- probably quite a few. But it would also insure that at least the 80 best ones (top rookie seeds) would have a shot. FIRST could offer more rookie based awards. It would also encourage teams to be active more in the off season preparing so they can register and pay up as early as possible.

It would also be fair to all in that EVERYBODY would have to deal with the nightmare of last minute arrangements. Only the regional winners would have any advantage over the pack by winning early. But hey- they DID win.

Of course the Championship could also be staged later or the building phase be staged earlier so there is a larger gap between the two for making travel arrangements.

Either this is a Championship or it isnt? If it is, ALL of the champions should be able to go. I propose this idea for 2004.

WC with my $.02