This year is our teams 10th year!!! The same format format has been used for our chairman’s award video for awhile. It is very unsuccessful. Last year I only kept it the same because I was given the responsibility very short notice (I was still working on it the morning of the presentation). This year though I have some time, so this year we are doing it alot differently. We have lots of things that make us different and a great team. But we need help organizing everything. We have a idea of a format we want now. But before we meet next, I would just like to hear what other ppl have to say.
Does anyone have any tips, for anything chairman’s Award?
Dig through this particular forum. For some reason, it doesn’t show all the threads by default, so you’ll have to go to “Display Options” down at the bottom and fiddle around with that.
Check the white papers, some teams publish their essays there.
Look up the websites for past Chairman’s winners, some have essays.
Many teams put their Chairman’s videos up on Youtube.
And these guys won the Championship award last year (Hawaiian Kids 359) :
Good luck! =D
EDIT:
Also, I wasn’t on the chairman’s award team (the group that did the actual essays and video) but I do know some of the ideas they worked with:
You don’t need to describe all of your team’s activities/accomplishments in every submissions. e.g. you don’t need to mention that you volunteered at a certain event in your presentation, video, other essays etc. Don’t try and cram everything in if you think it woudl be better to fully describe other activities in mroe detail.
Our 2011 CA video was much better than our 2010 and leaps/bounds vs. our 2009 one.
As the OP has stated, given the task and doing it last minute vs. doing it with much more preparation and time makes a difference.
Every team works hard and we find inspiration in seeing many teams do what they do outside of building robots, BUT, were you able to capture the moment?
Our CA video was by far the hardest part of the CA entry vs. the essay, team pics entered, and the interview process. We spent almost every day working on it from day 1 of the school year…editing, re-shooting, cutting things out, putting in clips again, rewriting the storyboard, just to name some of the challenges in putting it together.
Til this day, some members of our video team still want to make changes.
Here’s a presentation I gave for one of the offseason workshops for other teams. I’m sure you can find similar resources on other teams’ websites too, if there are some questions left unanswered afterwards.
I think the key for the video (and your submission as a whole) is to find what works for your team. You’ll see stuff in our video (such as the Australian Flag) that probably won’t work for your team. We also try to incorporate as much of our team as possible. For example, because we have a bunch of students who love animating, we try to include that in the video as seen with the graphics on the bottom of the screen.
Hi,
if you don’t know me or of me already, I am former member turned mentor of 359 in charge of chairmans and other award submissions and presentations. I was thinking of maybe doing some helpful youtube videos for teams needing help? I would like to know what you all (teams wanting help) think.
If you go to the CD-Media section, papers, and use the word Chairman in the search field, you will find lots of previous entries and some tips.
It is too late, but for future reference some Kickoffs - such as the one in Upper Darby PA - have seminars on how to submit a Chariman’s Award entry, given by previous winners.
Here is presentation given in 2008 at Kickoff - it doesn’t discuss the video **(which wasn’t required then) but can still be useful. I’ll see if they can post this year’s slides.
And for the past three years (and most likely again this year) there is a conference/panel discussion presented at Championships entitled “Chairman’s Award Chat - Talk with Championship Chairman’s Award Teams” which can be very useful.
**I personally think the essay and presentation to the judges are more important than the video. The essay is the first thing the judges read and you can go into more detail there. And the presentation is a make or break - you can either wow the judges or ruin all your chances face-to-face. But I don’t know for sure; this is just my guess.
We are submitting for Chairman’s for the first time this year and so much of the information is about the video. But in reality the video should be one of the last items on the priority list because it is not even due until the competition date, correct?
I read the sames section that was posted previously but then so much emphasis is put on the video throughout the packet and tips guide so it makes it a little confusing. Am I understanding this right?
I am mentoring the Chairman’s Committee this year so any help would be greatly appreciated. I am just trying to get my head around everything and make sure that I fully underestand it all.
Thanks! After all of this, I now have much more respect for the Chairman’s teams!
The video is important in the sense that if you don’t have one, you most likely will not be allowed to do the Chairman’s interview at the regional and not be eligible for the regional Chairman’s Award.
On the other hand, as Cynette and Carol have both said, the written submission and interview have the greatest impact with the judges during consideration for the award and the video of the Chairman’s Award receipient is reviewed for a potential showing at the regional.
Remember to pay attention to copyright rules while creating your video, especially when considering video and music included in the video. Look for music that can be freely used without copyright violation.
Does anyone know the due date for this year’s chairman’s award?? We can’t find it on the FIRST site! Dx also a handbook or something of the sort would be very helpful, we’re slacking…
First of all, please remember that while we often focus on winning the Chairman’s Award, that it is the effort to win that matters. No one “loses” RCA… if you’ve worked your butt off all year in the spirit of the award, then you’ve already won before you even get to the regional. Our team submitted for the Chairman’s many times, comfortable in the knowledge that while we had done a lot over the course of the year that other teams had done more and were more deserving of the award. We were able to celebrate their success and still be proud of our own contribution. Formally documenting our efforts as part of our application was a capstone of the year’s work. While we never won an RCA, we were a better team because we tried… and maybe once or twice we made it a tough decision for the judges!
And that decision can be tough. Last year I had the honour of being part of an RCA judging panel. I wish there was some way to truly convey the respect that the judging panel held for all the teams that submitted while respecting the confidenitality of the judging process. We read, carefully, every word of the written submissions. We were blown away by the quality of the carefully practiced presentations. Several teams finished their presentation within ten seconds of “the bell”. Not that we were judging on time, but it underscores just how carefully they had practiced compacting a year’s worth of activity into one short, dynamic presentation. In the end we had to choose one recipient of the award and it was very, very difficult to do.
It is probably too late to start on this for this year if you haven’t been doing it all year long, but one thing that we truly appreciated was the documentation that teams provided that illustrated their activities and demonstrated their impact. Having photos of events, thank you notes, newspaper clippings… proven, hard facts that backed up the key elements of the presentation in an organized fashion was very helpful.
Find a team in your area that has won multiple RCA’s and ask if they can show you the documentation that they bring with them to the judging room. The cool thing about the RCA is that the teams that truly deserve it are teams that want to help you win it. And believe me… there are many more teams who deserve an RCA than there are awards!