The REC Foundation sent an email today to all registered VEX IQ Competition teams announcing VIQC Open Divisions for the 2022 VEX Robotics World Championship in Dallas, TX.
Any registered VIQC team is eligible to register for the Open Division. There are 80 spots for the MS Open Division (1 Division) and 160 spots for the ES Open Division (2 Divisions). Each organization is limited to 5 teams. The Open Division registration spots will be filled in the order that teams apply (first come, first serve). All Open Division teams will have the same judging and awards as Qualifying Divisions. The teamwork champions from the Open Divisions will advance to the overall finals.
Please note that teams that register for the Open Division but qualify for VEX Worlds will be moved from the Open Event to the Qualifying Event.
In summary, we are inviting teams that have not directly qualified for VEX Worlds to register. All these teams will compete in their own division. I describe this as an early invite from the Wait List.
So why is the REC Foundation doing this? Frankly, many of our international teams have communicated to us that they are not able to travel to Texas for VEX Worlds this year. In VEX IQ, we have a large percentage of our qualifying spots allocated to international teams. We did reallocate some of these available spots to State and Regional Championships, but many events said they had enough spots already. We know how hard it is teams to get approval to attend VEX Worlds and with so many spots available, we did not want to wait until after the State and Regional Championships were finished to open this opportunity.
Some questions I expect to be asked:
Will international teams still be invited to VEX Worlds? Yes!! We only reallotted spots to the Open Division from other (non-US) countries that confirmed they will not be attending. For any country that said they are attending or are still considering attending, we did not change their qualifying spots.
Will there still be a Wait List, and will we invite teams from the Wait List? Yes and Yes! As in previous seasons, we still expect to have some additional spots available after the completion of State and Regional Championships and we will invite teams from the wait list to fill these spots.
Will we announce Open Divisions for VRC? Maybe. Countries with VRC qualifying spots communicated it was more likely that VRC teams will still travel to Texas for VEX Worlds so there are fewer spots available. But we monitor this daily and if there is an increase in the number of spots, we will consider adding an Open Division for VRC too.
The REC Foundation is genuinely excited for organizations / teams that may have not had the opportunity to attend VEX Worlds to get this opportunity. We have heard hundreds of stories how attending VEX Worlds changed their organization. Now more teams will be able to experience the excitement of this amazing event!
Best Regards,
Dan Mantz
CEO - REC Foundation