New FRC Job Posted, Chairman’s Award – Part II, District Team Registrations for Regionals, and More Love for our 2013 Volunteer of the Year
Blog Date:
Tuesday, September 17, 2013 - 13:12
New FRC Job PostedIf you check out the employment area of the FIRST website - http://www.usfirst.org/aboutus/employment - and click on the ‘search’ button, you’ll see ‘Program Manager for FRC’ as one of the jobs listed. This position is essentially the replacement for my prior position as FRC Deputy Director, with some tweaks. This is a senior management position within FRC. The individual selected for this position will be assisting me with critical tasks within FRC, and will have significant influence on the organization. That’s the upside. The downside is, you have to work for me.
I encourage folks to review the job description and qualifications, and if you think this is a good fit for you, please apply.
Chairman’s Award - Part II
Most of the feedback we’ve been receiving on the recent change to Chairman’s Award – opening it up for teams to apply at multiple events - has been positive. Not all, but most.
I wanted to talk just briefly about the process we used to make this change. Any substantial change we would consider making to Chairman’s Award is a big deal, so we sought lots of feedback, from the FRC Staff, other departments in FIRST, Senior Management at FIRST, Hall of Fame teams, Woodie Flowers Award winners, District Representatives, and Chief Judge Advisors. To be clear, not all the feedback we received was in favor of the change. The issues usually pointed out were the ones I mentioned in the original blog. The bottom line is, this decision was a result of hours of work, over several months, by many people. If there is credit to be assigned for this change, it should go to the group. Blame should be directed at me.
Also, I want to add detail regarding eligibility for awards for District teams attending Regional events. All teams, including District teams attending Regional events, are eligible for all team awards, including Chairman’s, at events they attend. This decision was just made. The ‘one win’ rule for Chairman’s Award applies across all events, District and Regional, so a team can’t win Chairman’s Award at more than one Regional, or more than one Regional/District combination.
In addition, if, for any reason, a team does not want to be considered for Chairman’s Award at a particular event, they can simply not sign up for an interview slot at the event. No foul.
District Team Registrations for Regionals
Last year, District teams were able to sign up for Regional events when Regional events opened for 2nd Event Registration. As a practical matter, this meant that District teams, who are already guaranteed two events and would be going for their 3rd event at a Regional, could block access to popular events for Regional teams attempting to secure only their 2nd event. District teams were not intentionally blocking Regional teams, of course, they were simply trying to get in an additional event, but I believe there is a fundamental unfairness here that needs to be corrected. So, for the 2014 season, District teams will not be able to register for Regionals until Unrestricted Event Registration, which is after 2nd Event Registration.
I recognize that for some District teams this will mean they are unlikely to be able to attend Regional events they have traditionally attended for years. This will be painful, and I’m sorry. However, I believe this is the best course of action for FRC at this time.
More Love for our 2013 Volunteer of the Year
Check out this article about Al Skierkiewicz, our 2013 FRC Volunteer of the Year: http://my.chicagotribune.com/#section/-1/article/p2p-77349002/
More recognition for Al, in the form of the Motorola Solutions School-Business-Community Partnership Award!
I’ll blog again soon.
Frank
That little district bit changes some things for certain teams that I’m aware of that come to Palmetto every year. What about you?