Chairman’s Award interviews are limited to twelve (12) minutes total; up to seven (7) minutes for a presentation by the team (which includes set-up) and up to five (5) minutes of question and answer led by the Judges. Not more than three (3) student team members, plus one (1) adult mentor, are allowed to attend the interview.
I know most teams take advantage of allowing 3 presenters in the room. I’m curious as to any advantages/disadvantages people have found with fewer presenters.
If you only have one or two presenters, why did you make that decision? If you have tried having different numbers of presenters, what was the best option?
My team is a Chairman’s rookie, however, we have discussed it and decided on doing a team of 3 presenters. Personally, we chose this because we don’t think that one or two people will always be able to think of the best response to every question. We like to utilize the potential of as many great minds as we can.
We are just going to make sure we are organized and have a systematic way to answer questions without interrupting each other.
If you can get three presenters do it. You want as many trained/knowledgeable students interacting with judges as possible in this aspect of the submission. It’s like the “optional” question in college applications, it’s “optional” but everyone is going to do it so it really isn’t.
Also, time with judges is really short in comparison to how much work we put in. So you want to use that 12 minutes as optimally as possible.
By using the max number of presenters of 3 you show that your team has more than just a couple students that know everything about your team. Additionally - I suggest your team have multiple students in the pit and stands that can speak to the structure, mission, vision, and goals of your team.
There are a lot of benefits to having 3 Chairman’s presenters, and I can’t really think of any disadvantages to be honest. Below I listed a few ones off the top of my head, I’m sure there are more!
With 3 presenters you can use each person to their full advantage if you have a large physical presentation (166 did this in 2016). Each person can carry something different, and it will be less clumsy when you can coordinate the entrance to the room.
Less material for each presenter to memorize (as a former presenter, I know that it can take ages to master one third of the presentation).
You can represent more diversity with your presenters. With more presenters, you can show off the range of your team members who all have different experiences and paths through FIRST.
Having three presenters also increases the number of students who get the opportunity to experience giving the presentation.
We particularly try to include some age diversity in the presentation team. If it’s all seniors presenting, the next year you are back to no experience in the room.
I find having three students also reduces the chance that everyone will draw a blank if you get an really unexpected question during Q&A.
Thanks everyone for your detailed responses! These are more or less my concerns with fewer than three people. I know the overwhelming majority is 3 students but I’d also be curious to also hear from the few have have one or two presenters - or those who vary from year to year.
Bit late to this thread, but my team always uses 3 presenters as well as the mentor who’s allowed to observe. Unless you’re limited by team size, of course, I don’t see any reason not to take advantage of all four people allowed in the room at once.
We have won Chairman’s 2 years in a row and fingers crossed, going for 3!! I want 3 kids in that room. Just in case somebody messes up or forgets what they are supposed to say, we have backup. We also have a fourth ready to go just in case somebody gets sick. Though to be honest, I think our Chairman’s kids would have to be in the hospital hooked up to lots of tubes to not be there! If you 1 or 2 kids who feel they can handle everything and have practiced speeches until they are blue in the face then go for it. However, remember if you are carrying in presentation boards and such, best to have as many as possible.
As has been said, it’s probably best to use three people. However, sometimes that’s not possible. My team doesn’t have many people, and if one of the three people we have lined up to present don’t show up to Competition, we lose a presenter. I think that’s the only situation we wouldn’t have three presenters.