This season, there are a lot of teams in my region, but relatively few events. I know of several teams who wanted to go to more events but could not find spots. I heard at my state’s Event Partner Summit that this year, Robot Events made some changes to improve the Early Bird system, such as making it so (if I remember correctly) if an organization wanted to swap one team in for another at a certain event, they couldn’t do so if the new team was signed up for 2 or more events already (though they might be able to do it by having the EP swap the teams instead).
Despite the improvement these changes made, there are still more improvements I’m hoping can be made to the Early Bird system, to create an even more even playing field between teams who are able to sign up for events immediately after they open, and teams whose coaches have more limited schedules and might not get a chance to log on to Robot Events until after the event is already full.
A few of my ideas (though I’m not sure how feasible they are) would be:
A system where teams on the waitlist with the fewest events can have their spots reserved for a certain amount of time. For example, if at the end of Early-Bird, 5 of the teams on the waitlist have competed in only 2-3 events each, other teams will have 5 fewer spots available, but these spots will be opened after a certain amount of time if the teams they were reserved for have not registered for the event.
Allow events to have multiple Early-Bird dates with different limits for each. For example, after Early-Bird ends, there could be another week where teams with only 1-2 more events than the Early-Bird limit could sign up for that event,
Allow regions and/or events to set different numbers for their Early-Bird rules. For example, an event could allow teams with only two events to sign up for theirs as a third event, or a region could use this rule for all events in their region.
Perhaps allow events more leeway in prioritizing teams with fewer events over teams with more events when inviting teams from the waitlist. (Perhaps even figure out a way to allow teams to get a full refund by withdrawing from an event so that another team can go to it.)
If this isn’t the case already, make sure there’s a warning when teams use Early-Bird (especially for multiple early-season events) that they might not be able to sign up for late-season events since those events might fill up before they get the chance.
Invitational events can offer this, but in order for the event to be official, the EP would need to also be hosting another event, and not all EP’s would necessarily be able to host two events in the same year (especially if some of their discounts apply to one event).
I like the idea of allowing late-season events limited to teams who haven’t qualified for Regionals yet, even if the EP hasn’t hosted any other events that season. This would give teams who didn’t qualify an extra chance to compete and to win awards that those who qualified don’t have, but those who already qualified are guaranteed to get another chance to compete by going to Regionals, and they also have more freedom to go outside their region for an event (if it’s fessible for them to do so) without worrying about whether that event can qualify them for Regionals in their home region.
I would also support having multi-region local events, where teams from nearby cities on opposite sides of state/sub-region borders (for example, Pensacola, Florida and Mobile, Alabama) could join together for a tournament, and both states would have award winners qualify for Regionals. Maybe even have both regions treat the event as if it was part of their region (the teams would still be treated as from the region allocating the spots), and give out qualifications the same way they would if it was out-of-state teams visiting that event’s state. For example, at an event in Pensacola, maybe Alabama has 4 spots qualify for States, and Florida has 3 spots qualify for Regionals; if an Alabama team wins a spot, they would qualify for States in Alabama, and in Florida the spot for that award would go to the next team in Skills; if a Florida team wins a spot, they would qualify for Regionals in Florida, and the spot Alabama gave for that award would go to the next Alabama team in Skills.
My gut, is if there is an issue with late season team registrations, your RECF EEM is more than willing to figure out a good path to make it happen.
Since we both started Toss Up seasons, I think it is fair to say there is a lot of good will by RECF regional representatives to figure out how to make seasons work. Last couple of seasons has been hard… what is good news, lots of teams have come back online this season.
As for demographics - I was pleased this season to have more than just CT, RI, MA - had team from VT come - because it was good to spread wings, not just get another award (but they did! )
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