Districts in Texas proposal sent to FIRST

[Coach Norm]

Texas Mentors and Coaches received the email below yesterday regarding Districts in Texas.

Norman

You are receiving this email because you are the main or alternate contact of a FIRST Robotics Competition team in Texas. Please read the email in its entirety.


Over the past several years, FIRST in Texas, the FRC Regional Directors in Texas, Senior Mentors, and other Texas organizers have worked together to research and evaluate District Model implementation in Texas. We have met with our friends in other states and regions who have already adopted the District Model (Michigan, New England, Pacific Northwest, Chesapeake, Indiana, South Carolina, and Georgia) to learn from their experience so that we can make the best decisions for our state. The change is not just to the size of FRC events, but includes significant changes to financial responsibility, team opportunity within the state, and, in our great state of Texas, geography and team travel costs. Our shared goal is to increase accessibility and opportunity for our teams in Texas, including the ability to sustain expected team growth for years to come.

After careful consideration and planning, we submitted a District Model draft proposal to FIRST Headquarters in May. Over the next few weeks, we will work with FIRST HQ to jointly determine if our logistics and funding plans match their expectations and those of the board of FIRST in Texas. Our goal is to make a final decision by the end of June as to whether or not Texas is moving to the District Model in 2017.

If we decide to move forward, you will receive extensive information detailing the logistics, how we plan to move forward in the district model and what to expect.

We look forward to communicating our decision in the next few weeks, and we hope to see many of you in late July at the UIL State Championship—FIRST Division.

Regards,


Ray Almgren
Chair, FIRST in Texas

[Akash Rastogi]

Hey Coach,

Will Texas be pushing for inter-district play (with points actually counting)?

-Akash

[marshall]

Originally Posted by Coach Norm

Texas Mentors and Coaches received the email below yesterday regarding Districts in Texas.

Norman

Is SC going district? I'm guessing he meant NC.

[FrankJ]

NC, SC: They are almost in the same place. Maybe SC is being absorbed by NC. [duck and cover mode on]

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by FrankJ

NC, SC: They are almost in the same place. Maybe SC is being absorbed by NC. [duck and cover mode on]

Ittl bitty pieces are: http://wtop.com/tech/2016/05/altered...rent-carolina/

[Michael Blake]

Who has a copy of the submitted "District Model draft proposal" to share with Texas FRC teams?

The document wasn't attached to my copy of the email notification which I'm sure was just an oversight--so whoever has a copy of the proposal please share it here on CD.

In the meantime, I've emailed and asked FIRST in Texas HQ to send me a copy of the proposal and I'm sure they will send in support of transparency and keeping teams well informed on this development.

--Michael Blake

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Who has a copy of the submitted "District Model draft proposal" to share with Texas FRC teams?

The document wasn't attached to my copy of the email notification which I'm sure was just an oversight--so whoever has a copy of the proposal please share it here on CD.

In the meantime, I've emailed and asked FIRST in Texas HQ to send me a copy of the proposal and I'm sure they will send in support of transparency and keeping teams well informed on this development.

--Michael Blake

Or, as is common when two legal entities are attempting to come to a contractual agreement, the details won't be made public until after the agreement is signed. It's not a question of transparency, it's a question of legal obligations for the two corporations. Personally, I wouldn't expect details to be made available until after an agreement was reached.

[Michael Blake]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

Or, as is common when two legal entities are attempting to come to a contractual agreement, the details won't be made public until after the agreement is signed. It's not a question of transparency, it's a question of legal obligations for the two corporations. Personally, I wouldn't expect details to be made available until after an agreement was reached.

Well... it is a question of transparency when it comes to how it will affect my teams that I have a responsibility to look out for.

To get the info _after_ the agreement is signed is TOO LATE to have an opportunity to review and comment and maybe to organize an effort to affect what the final agreement form is.

This change over is the BIGGEST thing to happen to Texas FRC teams, ever... and IMO the affected teams should be apprised of what's proposed and should be afforded an opportunity for input.

--Michael Blake

[ahartnet]

Originally Posted by Michael Blake

Well... it is a question of transparency when it comes to how it will affect my teams that I have a responsibility to look out for.

To get the info _after_ the agreement is signed is TOO LATE to have an opportunity to review and comment and maybe to organize an effort to affect what the final agreement form is.

This change over is the BIGGEST thing to happen to Texas FRC teams, ever... and IMO the affected teams should be apprised of what's proposed and should be afforded an opportunity for input.

--Michael Blake

Michael,

We (as Texas mentors) have had a chance to provide comments and input about districts for quite some time now. In May of 2015 an email was sent to all texas teams with everyone that is on the 20 person District Competition Committee and how to reach them. The committee is comprised of members from a range of types of teams. There were 5 POCs for the Alamo regional that the email literally urged you to correspond with to give your input.

IMO, like Jon said, it doesn't make sense to send out what was proposed. People will start planning towards what was proposed when FIRST could reject it out right, accept it as is, or suggest major modifications. Two of those three options could then cause plenty of people to get all up in a huff about the changes (whether it's "why wouldn't HQ accept that" or "why did HQ accept that").

Transparency is good. I think FiT sending out this email now saying that a proposal has been sent to HQ is being much more transparent than some things we've seen in the past. Even with all the UIL discussion, I didn't know there was really a chance to become UIL in the middle of the school year/build season, and threw me for a loop. This allows us to continue to make plans for regionals next year, while being prepared for possible changes, and lets us know that the "Texas districts soon" is a REAL thing this time around, as opposed to the past 2/3/4 years where I've heard "Texas districts soon".

[waialua359]

Looks like Texas will be a priority for us in 2017 if they dont go districts. Running out of places to play.
But anyhow, good luck with getting it. Any area that can implement districts is an overall benefit for all participating/eligible teams.

[mwmac]

Originally Posted by waialua359

Looks like Texas will be a priority for us in 2017 if they dont go districts. Running out of places to play.
But anyhow, good luck with getting it. Any area that can implement districts is an overall benefit for all participating/eligible teams.

Boise is nice in the Spring

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by mwmac

Boise is nice in the Spring

I hear Hawaii is not bad also.
We will be in Idaho one day soon!

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by mwmac

Boise is nice in the Spring

So it Duluth... wait, scratch that. No it's not

[Coach Norm]

Originally Posted by waialua359

Looks like Texas will be a priority for us in 2017 if they dont go districts. Running out of places to play.
But anyhow, good luck with getting it. Any area that can implement districts is an overall benefit for all participating/eligible teams.

+1

[ASD20]

Originally Posted by ahartnet

Like you stated, the thing that will be interesting to me about Texas districts is there's a significant # of teams that don't have more than 1 event (currently) within 300 miles of them, and some of those don't have any event within 300 miles. If the normal district rules apply, forcing those teams to do two competitions in Texas could place a significant burden on them, or force something like Lubbock to host 2 district events back to back with many of the teams competing in both against a roster of teams that is mostly the same, or some other solution I have not heard of/thought of. There's a LOT of Texas that is not within a couple hours drive of San Antonio, Austin, Dallas, or Houston.

Texas had 136 teams in 2015 according to this, so there will probably be around 7 events minimum (2 plays per team at 40 team events comes out to 6.8 events needed), though there will probably be several more, maybe like 10 (this is a complete guess), in actuality. According to TBA there were 4 events in Texas this year, so there will likely be twice or more as many events in Texas on the district model compared to the regional model. While I am sure some teams will have a larger travel burden because of districts, many teams will probably end up with more events close to them than they currently have.

Basically, I am trying to say that the change in travel burden will, at a minimum, probably not be quite as bad as you think, if not make things easier for a lot of teams.