With the growing concern over the effects of competition in youth sports programs this summer, many Canadian soccer associations eliminated the concept of keeping score.
If you’re not first you’re last.
But seriously, an 8 yr old put it into perspective a couple weeks ago “Wow, you were second? There were like 40 teams there”
I hate the everyone is a winner stuff. But I mean, we all do build some pretty cool[1] robots. So, while there are definitely winners, I’m not convinced there are losers.
[1] New Englanders - would this have been an appropriate use of the word “wicked”?
This is why everyone should watch Karate Kid II. while the opening is powerful, the ending even moreso.
This middle is really there just to support getting you from the beginning to the end.
It does, and I get what he’s trying to say. “Never settle for second best.” But I think there needs to be a balance. 
This has been discussed and I don’t think there is yes or no answer to it depends on a lot of different things. For me personally I was brought up in a very competitive family as my brothers and I used to race professionally and that cost a lot of money so if we didn’t win, it was a waste of a lot of money and resource. In the race no one recognized or sponsored the driver who came in second. that stuck with me in first aswell. I wasn’t happy with any placement unless we won. I personally laughed at the pins given out and the finalist awards given out.
But it all depends on how and what people what from first. That going to decide whether everyone is a winner or just the winner.
But you can’t forget that when you go out in the real world you will lose some compitition whether it be that dream job etc. and if you have spent your whole life believing everyone is a winner when you don’t get that job it may be a harsh realization.
See that’s what I don’t want to have happen, and although I know first will never completely take away scoring there is still the possibility of a less competitive competition. I love competition and during the build season knowing that my actions will have an impact on the team at our regional leads me to be more focused and therefore learn more.
+1
Best use of a Karate Kid movie ever.
This thread is pretty relevant to me - this weekend my team was a finalist (one goal away from winning!) and Engineering Inspiration winner. Overall, I think we agreed that even though we were disappointed about not winning, we were very proud of making it to finals, especially considering the turnaround we made from being in dead last on Friday. Even though we had hoped to win a Chairman’s Award, we were very proud of the EI, and appreciated the team that did win (go 3641!). So I guess my point is that whether you feel like you won depends on the team and your circumstances, and you can feel both proud of your accomplishments while also recognizing your shortcomings.
This was my first year in robotics. I thought it was a “real” robotics competition. It isn’t, and FIRST says that. You can watch this video from 1992 when FIRST was a real robotics competition. All the awards are great, but should be separate from the robotics competition. It should be an elimination tournament and based on individual merit. If your team works hard, has a great drive team, and builds a fantastic robot, your team should be rewarded for that work. The awards should not affect rank in the robotics portion at all. If it were a true competition, more people would come to watch it. And that is the best way to spread the STEM message. FIRST needs to encourage fan support.
“Wicked cool” would be appropriate. Just “Wicked” without “cool” would not be.
Yes, just like in the real world. :rolleyes:
For our team and what I also believe individually, is that you only lose if you didn’t give it your all. If we lose because the other alliance was just better than us or just wasn’t our day then we can be proud of our accomplishments. If we lose because of a lack of trying or caring throughout the season though, that’s when we are really losers. Loosing every now and again is okay too. It’s what can kick start a team to becoming winners down the road.
If you are number one in the individual district rankings, and another team was not, but won Chairman’s and knocks you out of the top four, what about your hard work on your robot? That’s why the two entities should be separate. Both are important, but separate.
My statement goes for everything, not just the robot or even frc for that matter. If you give it your all at anything then you are a winner in my eyes. Yeah you might not be rewarded all the time but if a person or team sticks to the mentality of giving it their all, the rewards will arrive eventually.
The quest for being competitive and winning are often confused and misunderstood. I want to challenge myself and my students to constantly strive for improvement. I don’t actually care about Wins and Losses. We were ranked 3rd and were finalists at the Orange County Regional and for our team that was a HUGE win. We were so incredibly happy to have had our robot perform how it was designed and to be at a competitive level.
Much like in other sports a teams success on the field are directly linked to their work off of the field. Our team has made numerous changes and improved in several areas. To prepare myself for this year I read a leadership book and one of the things that stuck with me was the following story.http://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/wooden-shoes-and-socks-84177. This article explains it in depth how legendary coach John Wooden started every basketball season by meeting with his team and teaching his players how to properly put on socks and shoes. He doesn’t talk about winning championships he focusses on the small things that he can actually control. It is not as binary as winning and losing as there is an infinite level of success.
To conclude, “The robot is a vehicle”. Ultimately the robot is a vehicle, not just for learning engineering but for learning life skills. Through First I have learned; how to lose, how to win, how to become a better person, how to lead, and so much more. I can’t really remember the matches my teams have won or lost. I can’t even remember the specifics of the regionals my team has won and lost. What I do remember is all of the connections this program has made for me and all of the opportunities that I have had because of it.
John Wooden was a fantastic basketball coach. Here’s how many wins he had in his career, taken from this article:
In 27 years as Bruin coach, his teams registered 620 wins, and only 147 losses while earning far more national honors than any other university.
Under Wooden, UCLA won an unprecedented 10 NCAA championships, including seven consecutive (1966-73). Included in the string is one of the most amazing win streaks in all of sports, 38 straight NCAA tournament victories.
Winning a competition with your robot is not important.
Being a Chairman’s team is.
This thread really struck a raw nerve with me. I shadowed a team this weekend whose town has a median household income below the national poverty line, and $30,000 below the median household income of the state. They drove a broken bus 8 hours through the desert to get to the competition. My brother used to mentor a team whose students barely showed up because they were working 2 jobs after school to support their family. These teams didn’t make the playoffs. Were they “losers?” Did they “not try hard enough?” Were they not “motivated?” Check your privilege. There are some people in this world for whom just showing up is a major victory.
I’m sorry if I’m being harsh, but for the past 20+ years Dean and Woodie have been giving speeches at FIRST events telling kids that just participating makes them winners. I don’t think they’ve “devalued” the program or made it less competitive in that time (as if that’s what FIRST is really all about), seeing as it’s grown from a few dozen teams to a few thousand.
1 alliance wins a given tournament but all teams teams have a chance to define, chart, and create their own success.
We would have loved to win all of our events this year but we have succeeded in growing as an organization by developing some really badass kids who want to sign the same blood oath to FIRST that I have.
Telling teams that win events that their accomplishments are not important is pretty disappointing. If that team defined success as scoring the blue banner that you get at the end of the bracket, and they achieved that goal, they should celebrate.
The quest for being competitive and winning are often confused and misunderstood. I want to challenge myself and my students to constantly strive for improvement. I don’t actually care about Wins and Losses. We were ranked 3rd and were finalists at the Orange County Regional and for our team that was a HUGE win. We were so incredibly happy to have had our robot perform how it was designed and to be at a competitive level.
Much like in other sports a teams success on the field are directly linked to their work off of the field. Our team has made numerous changes and improved in several areas. To prepare myself for this year I read a leadership book and one of the things that stuck with me was the following story.http://newsroom.ucla.edu/stories/wooden-shoes-and-socks-84177. This article explains it in depth how legendary coach John Wooden started every basketball season by meeting with his team and teaching his players how to properly put on socks and shoes. He doesn’t talk about winning championships he focusses on the small things that he can actually control. It is not as binary as winning and losing as there is an infinite level of success.
To conclude, “The robot is a vehicle”. Ultimately the robot is a vehicle, not just for learning engineering but for learning life skills. Through First I have learned; how to lose, how to win, how to become a better person, how to lead, and so much more. I can’t really remember the matches my teams have won or lost. I can’t even remember the specifics of the regionals my team has won and lost. What I do remember is all of the connections this program has made for me and all of the opportunities that I have had because of it.
I’m sure teams like that do not have as many sponsors. Is there a scholarship program for them so that they would be able to do more than just show up?