Early Bird Qualifier news, impacts to NTXFTC, your help wanted

[Patrick R. Michaud]

TLDR: FiT leadership has told FIRST HQ to cancel the Early Bird Qualifier event, over the objections of local planners. As a result, the event is being converted to a "mock qualifier", and we want local help to support the teams that are having their seasons cut in half. Read the full text below for important details.

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Hello North Texas coaches and teams,

As many of you will have heard by now, the leadership at FIRST in Texas (FiT) has canceled the Early Bird Qualifier event that was scheduled for October 26. Discussions regarding events like the Early Bird Qualifier had been taking place with FiT's former FTC Operations Manager since at least March. The purpose of the qualifier was to provide better equity to teams and team members in the area for which the league play model poses unique hardships in terms of travel, participation, and obtaining the benefits of FIRST Tech Challenge.

This event had widespread support and extensive planning from North Texas key volunteers and other stakeholders, and local demand and need for the event has been amply demonstrated. According to what we're being told, the cancellation is a result of a contact made by a team mentor directly to the FiT Executive Director and the board of FIRST in Texas, bypassing Lon Cherryholmes and local planners entirely.

Despite the clear need and demand for this style of event in North Texas, the Executive Director and Board of Directors for FIRST in Texas have declared that it must be canceled. They are unable to provide any clear or quantifiable examples of how the Early Bird Qualifier represents inequity to other FiT teams, whether in North Texas or beyond. Canceling the event clearly poses inequities to the affected teams in North Texas -- particularly accessibility to STEM for low-income and underrepresented students. Still, FiT is choosing to be blind/uncaring about this outcome.

I will say that the NTX FTC Key Volunteers and planning group are very upset by this decision coming from FiT. The teams for which this event was created -- and which had already paid their event registration fees and built their schedules around the event -- have just had half of their competition season taken away from them. There's not really a way (that FiT will allow) to make their season whole.

Because the need for an event like this is still so acute -- and everyone involved from FIRST HQ to FiT to NTX key volunteers agrees on this point -- the October 26 event is being converted to become the "Early Bird Mock Qualifier". This event will be run exactly as if it is an official FTC qualifier event (including judging, playoffs, awards, and trophies), but it will have zero advancements to the NTX Area Championship.

On behalf of many volunteers in NTX FTC, I'm encouraging teams and coaches to strongly support this Early Bird Mock Qualifier, and show support for those teams that are negatively impacted by FiT's decision. We want this event to be as good a "qualifier" as we can make it, with oodles of Gracious Professionalism and a great competition experience for all. For this we will need teams that are ready to compete at some level, and volunteers for the many roles that a large FTC tournament typically requires.

Teams can express interest in attending the mock qualifier at http://tiny.cc/ntxftc-early-bird . Teams selected to compete in the mock qualifier will need to pay a $50 registration fee to FiT. Volunteers can likely register interest via the firstinspires.org dashboard.

So, how does all of this fit in with the rest of the season planning?

The Full Moon "Screamage" is still scheduled to take place on October 19th at Marcus High School in Flower Mound; it is currently at capacity but that may change as a result of the mock qualifier. It's important to recognize the differing purposes of the two events:

The Oct 19 scrimmage is really intended as a "workshop" -- yes, we will set up a schedule and play matches, but it's also intended as a gathering place and workshop for teams to come together in a relaxed and fun environment to share robot tips, ideas, work out kinks in their robot designs, and the like.

The Oct 26 mock qualifier is intended to run as if it is a real qualifier. We will be strictly observing competition format, including inspection, judging, match schedules, alliance selection, and playoffs. It's intended for teams that are "ready to compete" and want to get some early experience for the season, and help provide a good competition experience for the teams that lost their qualifier event. It will undoubtedly be a "fun" event (as all NTX FTC events are), but it will also carry the intensity of being run as a real competitive event. The only thing it won't have is actual advancements. (The other thing is that this will be one of the first-ever "qualifiers" in the world to use the new competition rules, so it will provide invaluable feedback to NTX, FIRST HQ, and FiT about the new rules.)

There are no restrictions on teams attending both the Oct 19 scrimmage and the Oct 26 qualifier. If your team registered for the scrimmage, but you would prefer to drop that registration in favor of the Early Bird, please let me know quickly at <pmic...@pobox.com>, so that we can invite teams currently on our scrimmage waiting list.

The December 7 "Winter Charger Qualifier" is still scheduled and expected to take place. Lon Cherryholmes (NTX FTC Program Delivery Coordinator) will undoubtedly release details soon for any teams interested in attending that event.

Other league events are expected to continue as previously planned, although the advancement numbers for all events have been adjusted somewhat as compared to what was previously published. See the North Texas FTC padlet ( https://tiny.cc/ntxftc-padlet ) for the latest advancement chart and league details.

Again, we encourage everyone to help us with these events and show our strong support for all North Texas teams. If there is sufficient demand we may hold a Chat/Clinic to discuss NTX developments further. You can of course contact Lon Cherryholmes if you have questions or concerns, but I'm willing to discuss and pass along messages as well. We would genuinely prefer that people with concerns about NTX FTC competitions at least make an attempt to address it locally, rather than going directly to the FiT executive director or board members.

Thanks for reading.

Pm