New York 2013

[Shad160]

It's been mentioned before that the majority of teams at States are from downstate, so this takes a load off of them, after the fact that they've had to fundraise to afford states for years (though I highly suggest that fundraising be done anyway to make use of newfound opportunities). This may even be considered retribution for when we had to deal with the monster(ously awesome) trip to Buffalo a couple years ago.

Anyway, car washes are your friend. Along with other fundraisers (we've sold
sunglasses before along with bowl-a-thons, both with great success)

[caseyotis]

Well, that's kinda true, I guess. But Long Island... NYC would be better, or somewhere in Westchester. Whatever. We probably won't even make it to states, haha.

I'm sure we can fundraise. It will be a good experience.

[gneissisnice]

Oh yeah, I'm probably the only one thrilled about this. But the advice I gave to my high school team is this:

Take advantage of that fact that States now costs $0 and go to an invitational. Be it Yale, 'Stoga, or pigeon even Athens. For all LI area schools along with NYC and neighboring counties, states is now a trip that doesn't require a hotel- use that to your advantage and use the money to get more competitions in.

And Case, coming down to Kellenberg from Ithaca is still a trip worthy of a hotel and team bonding. Don't despair

I'm happy for the same reason.

I told the Ward Melville kids about the Yale invitational, and they were interested, but they figured that there would be no room in the budget for the trip. Now that States is practically free, they can actually use the money to go to the invites. I let the team captain know today, he seemed excited and he'll discuss it with the rest of the team.

Overnight trips for states are fun and it does suck that they'll miss out on that, but it's a whole lot better than a long bus ride.

[Shad160]

The way I see it, the missed overnight trip for States can be made up with the overnight trip to an invite. This is THE opportunity to go out and get more competition experience for schools on the Island, props to Brother Nigel for getting this set up.

And for upstate schools that are upset, West Point will be back soon- 2015, right? NYS pretty much took the time during the gap to hit all points of comfort for the state-All the way West in Buffalo for '12, A more reasonable center in M-W for '13, and all the way East on Long Island for '14

[andrewwski]

It's been mentioned before that the majority of teams at States are from downstate, so this takes a load off of them, after the fact that they've had to fundraise to afford states for years (though I highly suggest that fundraising be done anyway to make use of newfound opportunities).

And for upstate schools that are upset, West Point will be back soon- 2015, right? NYS pretty much took the time during the gap to hit all points of comfort for the state-All the way West in Buffalo for '12, A more reasonable center in M-W for '13, and all the way East on Long Island for '14

You seem to be saying that West Point is "upstate," when in fact most people in New York State would not consider it so. West Point (where downstate teams have had to "fundraise to afford states for years") happens to be:

1 hour from New York City
1:45 from Islip
1:45 from Albany
2:30 from Binghamton
3:00 from Utica
3:30 from Syracuse
4:45 from Rochester
5:30 from Buffalo

I'd say that heavily favors downstate - upstate teams certainly would have to fundraise as much if not more...

I'd also challenge your statement that M-W was a "center", note the respective travel times for the aformentioned cities:

1:00 New York City
1:45 Islip
1:30 Albany
2:15 Binghamton
3:00 Utica
3:15 Syracuse
4:30 Rochester
5:30 Buffalo

So the only year I see where complaints of travel from NYC are valid is 2012 in Buffalo. For all others, NYC/"downstate" is closer than any other major city to the tournament. So that argument doesn't apply at all.

[caseyotis]

Ha. Thank you, andrewwski. Looking at a map of the counties in New York, those two aren't close to center at all.
http://geology.com/state-map/maps/new-y ... ty-map.gif
Monroe-Woodbury and West Point are both in Orange County. Look at the distances.
Somewhere fair would be, like, Broome Community College or something. It's three hours from Buffalo and New York City, and 3 1/2 hours from Uniondale. But, whatever.

[YUSO]

Oh yeah, I'm probably the only one thrilled about this. But the advice I gave to my high school team is this:

Take advantage of that fact that States now costs $0 and go to an invitational. Be it Yale, 'Stoga, or pigeon even Athens. For all LI area schools along with NYC and neighboring counties, states is now a trip that doesn't require a hotel- use that to your advantage and use the money to get more competitions in.

And Case, coming down to Kellenberg from Ithaca is still a trip worthy of a hotel and team bonding. Don't despair

COME TO YALEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

[YUSO]

There's an understandable tendency among those who haven't been involved in planning a tournament and logistics on this massive of a scale to easily criticize the decisions made by the aforementioned organizers. However, once you realize just how much goes into setting up an SO tournament, let alone a statewide one, you'll begin to understand and perhaps even sympathize with the directors. This realization can only really come with running a competition on your own.

I say this because I responded in the same way you guys did when States was moved to Buffalo last year. I was already in college at the time, but nevertheless made the 90-minute train ride down to NYC the night before to join my HS team on the 14-hr bus ride up. However, once I started planning the Yale invite this past spring, it became very clear to me just how much work is involved in coordinating a tournament and that the 15 seconds worth of applause we give to these State Directors at awards ceremonies really isn't enough to thank them for what they do. I had enough trouble getting things together for an INVITE at ONE school, and can't even imagine what it's like to coordinate across campuses to secure a location (and insurance worries and all that other administrative pigeon) that'll make everyone happy in a huge state like NY. If I were in Harold Miller's shoes and Bro Nigel Pratt came up and said "hey so we can hold States at Kellenberg without much pigeon work," I'd take it in a heartbeat, because it's already better than Buffalo.

Therefore, criticism is understood, but should be formed in the context of what I said above and the difficulties all Directors face. Just my thoughts here. You're not wrong, but there are hidden factors you can't quite grasp as a competitor. I, for one, never did until 4 months ago.

Plus, remember this is all volunteer work. No one's getting paid to do any of this.

Oh, and I didn't even start mentioning budgets yet. Ha...

[JTMess]

On behalf of all upstate and western teams, we would like to point out that kellenberg is practically the farthest point from central New York as could possibly be chosen. This poses a tremendous disadvantage to all teams not residing in New York City or Long Island. As one of the northernmost teams, we face a drive upwards of 8 hours to reach kellenberg and an estimated increase of 50% in travel and lodging costs. This will catastrophically deplete our resources, eliminating any opportunities to attend invitationals earlier in the season. In many tech events, northern and western teams will be at a major disadvantage in comparison to local teams due to packing and transportation. We feel that if the state competition could be moved to a more central location, if would present a more fair competition to teams from throughout the state.

[YUSO]

On behalf of all upstate and western teams, we would like to point out that kellenberg is practically the farthest point from central New York as could possibly be chosen. This poses a tremendous disadvantage to all teams not residing in New York City or Long Island. As one of the northernmost teams, we face a drive upwards of 8 hours to reach kellenberg and an estimated increase of 50% in travel and lodging costs. This will catastrophically deplete our resources, eliminating any opportunities to attend invitationals earlier in the season. In many tech events, northern and western teams will be at a major disadvantage in comparison to local teams due to packing and transportation. We feel that if the state competition could be moved to a more central location, if would present a more fair competition to teams from throughout the state.

And knowing Harold Miller, I'm sure he only went with this very subpar choice after exhausting all other possibilities; his reputation is not one of settling for less when something better can be obtained. Securing locations is the bane of all SO State Directors. If one of the most experienced, stern, no-pigeon attitude-wielding State Directors changes locations every year since West Point went out of commission, you know that there are true hardships in securing venues.

If you really want to talk about fairness, then it wasn't too fair last year for NYC/LI teams to lug their butts 12 hours to Buffalo (which is more than your projected 8 hours). You had the advantage then, and now it's their turn. That sounds fair. (In any case, I highly doubt Harold set it up to be this way to get back at you guys. Guaranteed, 100% there are other pressures forcing him to do this. It just so happened to work out so that I could point out it's actually fairer than you're saying if you factor across years.)