There are large portions of teams that aren’t directly building or designing the robot like marketing, outreach, and administration to handle events and reaching new freshman. With the online-hybrid learning that most schools will continue to do for a while combined with a lack of in-person events, I wonder how teams will keep members engaged and get new members excited.
This is pretty upsetting, but I understand where they’re coming from. Organizing a massive competition where in-person guidelines and restrictions vary so much would be a huge feat and most likely not work well, frustrating even more people who have poured more time and energy into building a robot that was said would be able to compete, only to find out their specific region can’t host events or something of the like.
If during the re-evaluation of the situation in January, does not allow for any game play for 2021, is it possible we will have the same game in 2022? This will matter to teams who want to continue improving their robots.
I hope we get a new game. Getting new students involved and excited is tough when the most exciting parts of the build process are already done. Maybe we just throw out the existing robot if we get Infinite Recharge again in 2022.
Yeah totally agree. I would much rather First come out and say this rather than wait 2 months and after most teams have had their rookie training. Now teams can approach training and planning with a more realistic understanding of how the season will work.
Jonathan, from that perspective yes.
But the majority of teams didnt even get to play during 2020 with the robot they built?
I’m not leaning towards wanting yet another replay or a new game. I just want to know upfront as soon as possible what the plans are, so we can plan accordingly.
Team registration includes access to INFINITE RECHARGE at Home, Innovation Challenge, Game Design Challenge, judged awards, scholarship opportunities, and the Kit of Parts as described above.
So if your team opts not to compete this year, are your students disallowed from applying to FIRST scholarships this year?
Yeah the fact that most teams didn’t get to have an event in 2020 makes it tricky. If First chose to replay the game yet another time, it could save on costs for First, but could also make the 2022 year a tad bland for the people who already “played” Infinite Recharge (most likely with no in person event) for two years. I just hope students dont get sick of this really cool game if it gets stretched out for so long.
I understand the logic, but whereas previously a team wouldn’t register for financial or administrative reasons, some teams are opting not to out of safety+increased financial burden due to a global pandemic.
I’m not entirely sure where I stand on this, to be clear, but I’m not sure I like the implication there given how oddly specific a scenario we’re in.
Ninja edit: Distributing 2K to graduating classes of sometimes more than 10 seniors seems like a drop in the bucket compared to FIRST scholarships.