Guys,
If you are a certified inspector and are traveling to either Championship, I am in desperate need for you to register in VIMS to help us out. At this point many of you know your team is going to St. Louis or Houston. I will be at both Champs so I hope to see some familiar faces (new faces are good too!). With inspecting ropes, (I expect to see at least 2000 ropes at each event) I need extra folks to get everyone prepared to play.
Thanks.
Al,
I applied 3/3 for Houston & STL all 4 days
… Rcvd confirmation of STL 4 days RI
?? is there delay in confirmations for Houston?
need to know asap to make Airline arrangements
(have tentative hotel reservations)
Returning RI (CMPs& multi-Calif regionals), Dale --… …–
Dale,
I know the computers at HQ have had problems this season and the VC is very over worked. I will let her know.
Applied when it was available (month or so ago), haven’t been accepted yet. Have for a qual and NEDCMP but not St Louis yet.
I’ll see what I can do about recruiting some inspectors from Bison Robotics to come down to St. Louis. It’ll really depend on how many of our teams qualify for how many inspectors I can get.
Is there a bigger need in Houston or St. Louis?
Ryan - From what I’ve heard at this point, the two events are roughly equal. Both need more volunteers for pretty much every position! I’m guessing a lot of it has to do with district volunteers waiting until after district championships to sign up, when they’ll know if their team is going… but that’s really just a guess. The more we get now, the better off we’ll be!
And besides, why wouldn’t you want to go back to St. Louis? It’s the last year there, and I’m really going to miss it next year!
That’s a good point. The Edward Jones Dome is a pretty awesome arena and all of our teams will be there. I was just thinking I could send some of our volunteers whose teams didn’t qualify to Houston to help out. I’ll definitely be in St. Louis 
Ryan,
At this point we have roughly half the staff needed at each site.
If First would arrange for Dorm type facilities to house [key] volunteers, I would pay for the flight. Otherwise, it is too expensive if my team is not going.
Al
I will be there in Houston. Our team has a high probability going into the last weekend at Boise of not qualifying but I will come and help out.
It will be nice to see you.
I can help with ropes… I was semi-designated rope inspector at the Central Washington event this year.
This would be interesting. I feel I could hitch a ride with a local team but can’t afford the cost of a hotel room of my own.
Don’t they do block hotel reservations? There was a system setup that I had the ability to go into last year but my team qualified so I never did. May have been different since I have a key position.
FIRST does have blocks of rooms available for volunteers in several hotels, but in my experience, they are still rather expensive, especially if you are volunteering the length of the event (arriving Tuesday and leaving Sunday, 5 nights).
HQ sent out an email recruiting referees for the CMP’s - probably targeted at those who passed the test and were assigned to an event. Maybe they can do the same for inspectors.
I applied, but I can only do Wednesday in STL since I’m a referee. And I’d have to take the certification, since ref and RI at an event is hard (doable, but tiring). However, I’m confirmed as a ref in STL! See everyone there!
Not to hijack a thread, but …
To Ref at Champs, you have to have Ref’d at a prior event (regional, district, etc.). They have fewer Ref’s this year at the events, so there are fewer qualified Ref’s to work Champs.
If First wants to have more Ref’s for Champs (they were short last year at Champs), they need to have more Ref’s at the competitions.
Firsst has sent out an email for recruiting RIs.
Thanks Bob. You can bring your vest as well. I want all LRIs to wear their vests so the division leads can tell who they can turn to for additional help and to answer questions for other inspectors.
Have room will share, both adjacent to venue. PM if interested. Dale RI @both
Hou: 18-22
STL: 25-29
Well I imagine I’m somewhat far from what Al had in mind for Inspectors, but I put in an application to RI. Don’t exactly have experience with it but my area was too saturated with RIs when I tried to volunteer at GKC.
It’s a long shot to be accepted for Champs but I’d like to help out if I can.
If you get accepted, you can stick with me through a few inspections. I’d be more than happy to get you trained up. We need more people who can volunteer in the KC area for whenever we move to districts.