FIRST Robotics Competition Blog

We hope everyone is getting excited for this very different season. We released information previously about the season’s offerings here. Teams have the opportunity to compete remotely for awards amongst all of our At Home Challenges as well as the traditionally submitted awards. The process will be a little different this year and we wanted to share a little more information about the judging process, so our teams know what to expect.

At Home Challenges

The At Home Challenges are:

• the Game Design Challenge,
• the FIRST Innovation Challenge presented by Qualcomm, and
• INFINITE RECHARGE^SM at Home

For each challenge, teams will be divided into groups, regardless of their location, and compete with other teams in that group (e.g. a team from Australia may be in the same group as a team from Michigan). Each group will have approximately 30 teams (range is between 25-35 teams) pending total number of teams participating. If a team is participating in multiple challenges, their group for INFINITE RECHARGE at Home, for example, may not be their group for the Game Design Challenge.

Judging of these challenges is not restricted regionally because we have no history to inform the number of teams that will compete in each challenge, and we want to avoid the possibility of groups ending up so small that awards would not be meaningful. Also, we value the mixing of teams from all over the world as is seen at some Regionals and FIRST Championship.

Additional information about the At Home Challenges will be released at the 2021 Kickoff!

Traditionally Submitted Awards

When we say “traditionally submitted awards” in the context of the 2021 FRC season, we’re talking about the Chairman’s Award, Dean’s List Award, and Woodie Flowers Award. For these awards, teams will be grouped by geographic location, as listed below. Each region will be able to award a specific number of Chairman’s Awards, Dean’s List Awards, and Woodie Flowers Finalist Awards. The exact number of awards for each region, and how that number will be determined, will be announced later.

This region-based approach for traditionally submitted awards differs from the approach to the At Home Challenges because we have a history with these awards and believe a sufficient number of teams will submit to keep the awards meaningful, even in the smallest regions. Also, the Chairman's Award and Dean’s List Award are best judged locally among local competitors. 

Within a few weeks of the submission portal closing, Judge Advisors (JAs) will randomly assign participating teams to interview time slots. They will contact teams via email to notify them accordingly (if a team cannot accommodate their assigned slot, they should let the JA know so it can be rescheduled).

Teams can find additional info on the interview process and submission info here!

Virtual Chairman’s Award Chat

At FIRST Championship, we typically host a Chairman’s Award Chat, an opportunity to ask questions from the experts and learn what approach other winning teams take. Due to the remote nature of our season and to allow all teams to be able to attend, we will host a virtual Chairman’s Award Chat on December 3^rd, 8pm – 9:30pm ET. This call will feature Chairman’s Award Judges and Hall of Fame representatives (i.e. previous Chairman’s Award Winners, including team members who presented and won the 2019 FIRST Championship Chairman’s Award). Register today!