Our team is very proud of our student who was named for Dean’s List and our mentor who was named for Woodie Flowers at our recent District event. My students and I are confused about the stages of these awards and the status of the candidates at each stage (semifinalist? finalist?). As my students report on these events for the media, I’d like them to be as accurate as possible, but we need some help to understand the process and the proper terminology.
At the District event where these nominees were announced, did the announcement make them semifinalists or finalists for their respective awards?
Is the field of candidates narrowed a second time when they move on to the FIRST in Michigan District Championship? If so, and our nominees are selected, what will their new status be after the FIRST in Michigan Championship? Any idea how many nominees for each award go into the FiM Championship, and how many move to the next stage at World?
If the field of candidates is not further narrowed at the Michigan Championship, does their status remain the same as it was at the earlier District event? Do they automatically continue on to further adjudication at the World Championship? How many Dean’s List and Woodie Flowers candidates from FiM go on to World?
How many candidates receive these awards at the World Championship?
FIRST Robotics Competition & FIRST Tech Challenge FIRST Dean’s List Semi-finalists, the group of two(2) students in their 10th or 11th school year nominated by each FIRST Robotics Competition or FIRST Tech Challenge team as applicable.
■ FIRST Robotics Competition & FIRST Tech Challenge FIRST Dean’s List Finalists comprised of the two (2) students selected at each FIRST Tech Challenge Championship Tournament, FIRST Robotics Competition Regional or FIRST Robotics Competition District Championship (the Qualifying Events). At FIRST Robotics Competition District Championships, more than two (2) students may be selected, depending on the size of the district.
■ FIRST Robotics Competition & FIRST Tech Challenge FIRST Dean’s List winners for both FIRST Robotics Competition and FIRST Tech Challenge are the students selected from the applicable FIRST Dean’s List Finalists at the FIRST Championship.
The woodie Flowers Finalist Award (wFFA) is presented to one adult mentor at each Regional Competition or District Championship.
■ The woodie Flowers Award (wFA) is presented to one wFFA winner at the FIRST Championship
Thanks, Jon Stratis. I’ve read the manual over and over again and still don’t understand, which is why I’ve asked my questions here. Can you (or anyone else) give me the “Awards for Dummies” version?
Nominees, usually annouced early in the district event, at least in PNW. This is usually 8-12 Dean’s List and 5 or 6 Woodie Flowers.
Semi-Finalists, usually announced with the rest of the awards. They qualify to move on to the DCMP. 2 Dean’s, 1 Woodie Flowers
Finalists, the Semi-Finalists compete for this award at DCMP. 1 Woodie Flowers, 2 or more Dean’s List. These folks move on to compete for the award at CMP.
Winners, The people who have moved on to CMP compete for this award there. 1 Woodie Flowers Award Winner, Several Dean’s List winners, sorry I don’t know how many.
Dean’s List: As soon as you submit your nomination, your student is a Dean’s List Semi-Finalist. I’m guessing your district event listed off the Semi-Finalists, because I don’t see anything indicating an award given at that level. At your District Championships (or for us Regional people, our regional), some (typically 2, but large districts like Michigan might get more) students win Dean’s List Finalist status. At Worlds, 10 students become Dean’s List Award winners.
Woodie Flowers: Your nominee is your nominee. At each regional or district champs event, one nominee becomes a Woodie Flowers Finalist Award winner. At Worlds, one current-year WFFA or renominated previous-year WFFA winner becomes a Woodie Flowers Award winner.
Sorry to be so dense about this. Our experience at our district event doesn’t line up with what Mr. V described upthread for nominees and semifinalists, and what Mr. V said partly conflicts with what vhcook said. So I’m still confused.
Woodie Flowers nominees were announced at the beginning of our district event. I believe there were about 10-15 on the list. Woodie Flowers was not mentioned again at the end of the event during the awards ceremony, so apparently all 10-15 of these mentors go on to the District Championship for further consideration. It sounds as though vhcook is saying that these mentors are considered **nominees **all the way through to the District Championship, where only one of them will become a finalist, but that conflicts with what Mr. V said, that all enter district events as nominees, but one mentor emerges from the district event as a semifinalist – which didn’t happen at our district event. So I’m back to my original question: Are these 10-15 mentors considered WF nominees, WF semifinalists, or WF finalists at this post-district event, pre-District Championship stage? Is the field further winnowed at the District Championship to only one finalist for all of Michigan, as vhcook and Mr. V seem to agree on?
As for Dean’s List, during the awards ceremony at the end of the District event, only one student from the 41 teams was named for Dean’s List. He then ran down to the field for high fives from all the judges, just as teams do when they receive awards. Mr V said that *two *student nominees are named as Dean’s List semifinalists at district events. Vhcook, on the other hand, said that all Dean’s List nominees are automatically semifinalists – but if that’s the case, why was only one student from 41 teams recognized at our district event?
In either case, it looks as though the student on our team is now a semifinalist for Dean’s List, eligible to potentially become a finalist at our District Championship. Do I understand that right?
I’ve only actually experienced the regional model, so my comments on districts are purely from my reading of the admin manual. From what Mr. V is describing, and from what you’ve described, it sounds like the way this actually plays out in districts is varying a bit both from the admin manual and from each other. I can see why you’d be confused.
In the end, I’d say your assessment of your student’s status sounds accurate.
That would be a huge crowd. If I remember the length of that list of nominees correctly from our district event (Kettering 2, Gary – were you the head ref there?), and a similar number are nominated at each district event, that would make 210-315 people out there at MSC vying for finalist!
So are these mentors considered nominees until that point, or are they semifinalists?
If you are participating in the regional model. You get two deans list nominees and one Woody Flower nominee. You get to pick the regional they are judged in if you participate in more than one regional.
If you are in district. You still get 2 Deans list & one Woodie Flowers. The finalists are judged at district champs. The is the only option in TIMs (STIMs for Woodie Flowers) where they are nominated. In Peachtree (Georgia), the Dean’s list nominees are interviewed at the district events. They announce the ones that will be considered at district champs at the district event. There is nothing in the manual about this so I expect it is a district by district thing. Since there is no interview process for Woodie Flowers, the nominees were asked to stand, but no one was recognized over the others.
Bottom line the Deans list & Woodie Flowers finalist are determined at district champs. How districts makes that determination apparently is somewhat open. Any announcement at district event is a district thing rather than something officially defined in the administrative manual.
Thanks for your response, FrankJ. I understand what you’ve said, but you didn’t lay out the terminology. Are mentors who are announced for WF at district events called **nominees **or semifinalists?
And do you agree that all Dean’s List candidates are nominees going into their first district event, and that the one or two who are announced at the end of the district event are semifinalists? And further, that the semifinalists from all the district events then go on to the district championship, where one or two of them will be named as DL finalists?
I’m asking about terminology here more than process. It pains me to print incorrect information in the newspaper, e.g. that Jane Mentor was named as a semifinalist, when she was actually just a nominee, or that John Student was named as a finalist, if he was just a semifinalist. Words are important. I don’t want any of our publications to be misleading.
Dean’s List Students once nominated by their team are semi-finalists. There is no term for a DL student once announced to be moving on from the District round to District Championship. They are Dean’s List Finalists once winning the award at a District Championship or Regional.
You are a Woodie Flowers Award Nominee upon being nominated by your team. That designation stay until a mentor is presented with a Woodie Flowers Finalist Award at a Regional or District Championship, at which point they are a Woodie Flowers Finalist.
Winning either DL or WFA at Championship makes you a Dean’s List Award Winner and Woodie Flowers Award Winner respectively.
For Woodie Flowers, there is no official terminology prior to the Woodie Flowers Finalists. For Michigan and other districts, the finalist will be named at the District Championship. Most would referee to them as nominees, but there is no official FRC lingo.
For Dean’s List, all of the students nominated by their teams are semi-finalists. Some of those semi-finalists will be selected for consideration at the District Championship. The winners at the District Championship are then Finalists.
If all nominees are semifinalists, I don’t understand why our team’s nominee was singled out from all the other teams’ nominees/semifinalists at our district event and announced at the award ceremony as if he’d earned some status that separated him from the rest. To put it a different way, if their status is different, as indicated at our district event, it seems odd to me that they’d share the same title (semifinalist).
I have no clue why they singled your team member out. Maybe it was a mistake? You have no distinction on your TBA page saying you have a deans list finalist which makes sense since that distinction can only be awarded at either DCMP or a Regional.
This is from a modified manual FIM produced in 2011
6.1.5 Dean’s List Award
Each Michigan team may nominate up to two members of their team for the FIRST Dean’s List award (The team may
select only one but not more than two). The nominations must be submitted by a single mentor from the team no later
than NOON AM EST on February 17, 2011 to https://my.usfirst.org/frc/tims/site.lasso.
Dean’s List award finalists will not be chosen at Michigan District Events. Instead, all Dean’s List Award nominations from
Michigan teams will be reviewed by a selected panel of Judge Advisors and Judges and 6 Dean’s List Award Finalists will
be selected across all Michigan Team nominees. These 6 Dean’s List Award Finalists will be announced at the Michigan
State Championship event. The 6 Dean’s List Award Finalists from Michigan will be considered for the FIRST Dean’s
List at the FIRST Championship in St. Louis using the essays provided.
So, I do not know why your student was singled out but regardless he is still a Deans List Semi-Finalist along with all of the other nominees in your district. If you have a video of him receiving said award I would love to see it as, it would probably reveal what it is for. And, If you do not I would email FIM directly to find out.
Because these titles are developed with the regional model in mind. In the regional model, there’s only regionals and FRC championship. The student(s) selected by each team are semi-finalists, and those who win at the regional level are finalists for the award at Championship.
In a district format, there’s simply too many students to consider them all at the DCMP alone (particularly in Michigan. As a result, the field is narrowed at the district event level. There is no distinction in title between the district event and those that advance to the DCMP. Your student was one of the semi-finalists selected to proceed to the DCMP, but all the students nominated by their team are also semi-finalists.
So just the ones who were singled out for recognition at district events are considered at the district championship, but all nominees, regardless of whether they are no longer in the running, are called semifinalists? I get it. It’s just unnecessarily confusing to use the same term for the nominees who were knocked out of the running and the nominees who are moving on to the next phase to vie for finalist. I don’t intend to take any of the honor away from the other nominees – our team had another nominee, in fact, whom we adore and are very proud of – but as one tasked with mentoring students to write news releases, I am always hammering at them for clarity and precision. This seems unnecessarily sloppy. So be it. At least now I have my answer!
It’s pretty much all been stated in this thread, but here’s my take. FIRST created the Dean’s List Award system with Regionals in mind - I think FiM had only used districts for a year or two when the award was created. Thus, only 3 levels needed to exist: Winner (crowned at CMP), Finalist (one or two from each Regional who go to CMP), and Semifinalist (nominated by the team and judged/interviewed at Regionals).
The system is the same at Regionals now (I think??), but the inconsistency arises with Districts. FIRST never created a Quarterfinalist or Nominee position, so those in the District system are left without an official name for those who don’t move on to DCMP. So those nominated by teams in District systems are in a grey area. They’re Semifinalists, because they’re nominated by their teams. But they’re not Semifinalists (yet), because they’re not necessarily advancing to Finalists at Districts.
FIRST seems to be leaning towards the former definition of Semifinalist. At District events (or at least, FIM Livonia), students who interview receive pins that say “Semifinalist” on them. I’m also pretty sure the Opening Ceremonies script specifically refers to the entire list as Semifinalists. In the end, it really doesn’t matter. Because there’s no official lingo, you can use either terminology. I figure most will say they’re Semifinalists when they receive the nomination, and Semifinialist if/when they advance to DCMP as well.
I think the OP understands the terminology now. I just want to point out something that may still be confusing to some people.
The old 2011 modified manual from FiM was how it was done in the early years of district model. At that time there were not as many district events and not as many teams. Students nominated by their teams will have their names announced at their team’s first district event. There was no judging at the district events. All the DL semifinalists move on to be judged at the district championship and 6 students were selected to be finalist to compete at the world championship. The terminology was clear at that time. All nominees were semifinalists and all semifinalists were judged together at the district championship. This is very similar to regionals.
Due to the rapid growth in number of teams in Michigan, it was felt that there were too many semifinalist to be judged at district championship. FiM decided to judge students at the district events and select one or two students to move on to be judged at district championship to become finalists. Yes there was no title for these selected students. I think in Michigan they select 8 students now to be finalists.