Yeah, the view from the pit is pretty terrible, really. Sorry to disappoint, Al! 
This is great, FIRST. Continuous improvement. I’m also personally happy about the more predictable timing between Einstein matches. None of us want more field errors on Einstein, but having time–known time–between matches after such errors would teams help a lot.
I really like this change. I’m especially optimistic about the flow of einstein really helping make the biggest stage as exciting as it can be. I wonder if FIRST would consider staggering the lengths of the field time-outs little. I know if I was playing on Einstein I’d happily take four minute timeouts in semis if I got an 8 minute timeout in finals, since I have more matches to get ready.
EDIT: I can’t believe I forgot we don’t have quarters on Einstein.
There are no quarters on Einstein?
I’ve heard from our 2012 drive team that the only worse seats are the ones for the backup bots. Though they do tell an amusing story about Koko Ed kicking out two drunks who somehow wandered onto the Einstein backstage (remember the tornado? I think they just pulled in random people off the street) and wanted to ‘flip the bird to the whole world’…
But this update interrupts my workflow! Now I have to keep all four streams running even longer…
:rolleyes:
Great improvement by FIRST. More teams that get reconised by FIRST for there outstanding work!
I have one questiong though, hopefully some one can anser it for me:
Do you only qualify for E.I. if you have won this award at regional level (the same thing that goes for chairmans) or do all the 100 teams in that division qualify for E.I.?
Can’t wait to see all the teams in St. Louis again this year!
Greetings from Team 4481 The Rembrandts, The Netherlands
2014 NC Regional Engineering Inspiration winner
2013 NC Regional Rookie All Star winner
Alright. I’ll be the first person to say I’m not so sure about this.
While I like the idea of certain awards being district level, because many teams deserve Quality awards, Innovation in control and Industrial design; I feel like with certain awards making them district level extremely decreases their sentimental worth. With a lot of teams it’s difficult to explain awards like Chairman’s to people outside of FIRST, but with things like Imagery it’s as simple as: “They said we were the best looking out of the ~200 teams there”. Now it’s something more like: “They said we were the best looking, but only out of the 60 we were with and 3 other teams also won this award and they were really cool too.”
The other thing that puzzles me is FIRST tries to stress that EI is not a “second place” to Chairman’s. But now that 4 teams win it a year as opposed to 1, and the Championship eligibility is now only for 1 year, they are very unequal (Also on a side note, has anyone noticed that they call it a “Regional Chairman’s Award” and an “Engineering Inspiration award”?).
While I can’t really argue with the way FIRST works, and I’m very gracious to be in it, this kinda gets to me.
400 teams at champs, ~100 per division. Still a prestiguous award.
Also, EI has always only given 1 year of qual. Only Champ Chairman’s gets lifetime.
It’s out of closer to a 100 teams for each division so it’s not that much different. Also it gives more teams a chance to win. How different is it really when you go back home and tell your supporters. They won’t even know the difference unless you point it out.
Engineering inspiration isn’t 2nd place chairman’s and now that is very clear. It’s judged differently and now it’s awarded differently as well. Championship EI has been a bit of a strange award for awhile anyway. It was often rather quickly overshadowed by the CCA winner. I think by giving it out at the division level it will actually get more recognition. Overall a good change for FRC.
Great suggestion Glenn.
Mr. Rip
Championship EI is judged the same way as regional EI, by the pit judges. All teams in the division would be eligible. No inside info, just my best informed guess based on past history
Oke, well that seems fair. Thanks for explaining 
Also there is a difference between the two awards. EI puts a lot more emphasis on STEM Outreach specifically, while Chairman’s tends to look at both Outreach, Community Service and helping FIRST grow. So unless you restructure the awards across the board, you couldn’t use EI winners as feeders for CCA.
In fact, there’s at least one team who’s actually taken home Worlds EI without a Regional one. Hawaiian Kids? I think.
FIRST: Awesome changes. Next request for awards - what is EI?
4 FRC events, then you’ve got FTC and FLL in the same arena as well XD
FTC is a effectively a double event with 128 teams in 2 divisions, FLL is a “very large” event with 80 teams, and don’t forget Jr. FLL with another 40 teams. So you have 8 events going on!
Edit: I totally missed Brandon’s Post (not sure how) I completely agree with you and had the same thoughts haha
Am I the only one who is a little disappointed in this change? I understand the reason this was done, and I know it’s not going to change back.
With certain awards I actually like this change. I like having 4 EI winners, partially because it is already basically (IMO) used as a runner up for Chairman’s. Having 4 RAS winners is very encouraging for rookie teams.
I know FIRST likes to spread the wealth and the more people that go home with hardware the greater the feeling of accomplishment everyone has collectively.
My main point is that it is nice to say that “We were the best in the division.” But that is so much less awesome to say than, “We were the best in the world.” One of the highlights of my FIRST career was winning Motorola Quality in 2008 at the championship. I don’t think sharing that feeling of accomplishment with 3 other teams would have had the same effect.
How will we ever know if we’re better than the Cheesy Poofs? Or Simbotics? (Go ahead, tell me that’s not what FIRST is about)
I also liked robot awards being on Einstein because you got to see robots you never played against (but were still competing with for awards). Now unless you are up for Chairman’s or you make it to Einstein you are really only in a quarter of World Championship.
Enjoyed reading the rest of your thoughts, but EVERY TIME this comes up I feel compelled to pop in to the discussion.
Nope. EI is NOT, and should not be, a runner-up for the Chairman’s Award. Separate judges, no presentation (at regional events/CMP… IMO the district system of ‘presenting’ for EI is kind of odd, and makes it too easy to think that it’s runner-up to CA). Similar objectives? Yes, but not the same. Chairman’s is the gold standard for changing culture, where EI might be a good sign that you’re moving in the right direction.
While I understand what you are getting at I can tell you that one of the hardest parts about judging at regionals is knowing that there are deserving teams that you CANNOT give an award for. We agonize over that. And the events I’ve done have been small (most of them sub 40 teams) and we still agonize over teams that deserve to have their efforts and innovations recognized but we can’t. I can scarcely imagine what it would be like if for every one team we couldn’t recognize we had 10… How do I decide which is more deserving of a quality award; a team that designed their transmissions to be easily swappable, a team that did analysis on every part of their machine and optimized each structure according to estimated loads, or a team that has a process built into their workflow with several QA checks in place? Who gets the award? It freaking sucks to decide that one.
Instead of viewing it was sharing the honor view it as FIRST and the judges recognizing more of our peers.
Well for what it’s worth I am from a district system (IMO is kinda the key here) where we DO present for the award like Chairman’s.
I also tend to see a pattern. In the time I have been involved in FIRST 1/2 of the Championship EI winners have gone on to win Chairman’s in the next few years.
2005 - 842 wins EI, 2008 - they win CA
2006 - 365 wins EI, 2007 - they win CA
2008 - 359 wins EI, 2011 - they win CA
2009 - 341 wins EI, 2010 - they win CA
One is about inspiring others, the other is about being a role model team, but the teams that inspire their community on level impactful enough to win EI at champs ARE role model teams.