An observation about coaches

[tiwonge]

In my observation, it seems that math teachers are over-represented as quiz bowl coaches.

Does this bear out in the larger view? Is there some reason why math people seem more drawn to quiz bowl (despite it having a smaller representation in the canon), or why people who enjoy quiz bowl are drawn to teach math?

[Beevor Feevor]

Where are you getting this from? This isn't meant as an angry challenge to your statement, but just out of curiosity, because a lot of coaches in my area are humanities people.

[tiwonge]

I guess my observation wasn't very universal. And my set of known quiz bowl coaches is somewhat small.

In Idaho, I suppose, a lot of the coaches are in the sciences because the longest-running thing here is a science bowl (that has some non-science questions in it). Maybe that colors my perception. The few high school coaches I know outside of the state are math teachers, too, but that might be that I tend to know math teachers.

[David Riley]

In Illinois, we have virtually all fields represented among our coaching staff.

[Dominator]

I had had the same observation as Colin some time ago. Perhaps it's not true that coaches at large tend to be math teachers, but it certainly has been my experience that math teachers are overrepresented among coaches I know. But then again I interact with a very non-random sample of coaches.

[dwd500]

I've yet to see another coach in my area, ever.

[tintinnabulation]

In my experience, math teachers are "over"-represented as coaches.

[Sniper, No Sniping!]

A lot of the local teams you might play as apart of your league are probably like a football or basketball coach with likely no teaching position or has a gig like teaching gym and being the faculty advisor for such a quiz bowl team is apart of what keeps them employed by the school district. This is the case with a few of the schools in our area.

In Ohio, on the statewide level, the traditionally strong programs are coached by Social Studies teachers (like Copley, Fisher Catholic, and Tippecanoe). I know the coaches of Northmont, Olmsted Falls, Solon and company are teachers, I'm not sure what they teach though. I personally don't know any quiz bowl coaches in Ohio that are math teachers.

[jonah]

For what it's worth, of the 363 active coaches in Illinois for which the IHSSBCA has info on subject(s) taught, 76 (21%) are teachers of math (and possibly of other subjects too). The next highest category is social studies of some kind (including history), then English.

[Rufous-capped Thornbill]

A lot of the local teams you might play as apart of your league are probably like a football or basketball coach with likely no teaching position or has a gig like teaching gym and being the faculty advisor for such a quiz bowl team is apart of what keeps them employed by the school district. This is the case with a few of the schools in our area.

In Ohio, on the statewide level, the traditionally strong programs are coached by Social Studies teachers (like Copley, Fisher Catholic, and Tippecanoe). I know the coaches of Northmont, Olmsted Falls, Solon and company are teachers, I'm not sure what they teach though. I personally don't know any quiz bowl coaches in Ohio that are math teachers.

IIRC, Bob Weiser of Solon is a retired Math teacher.

[Unicolored Jay]

A lot of the local teams you might play as apart of your league are probably like a football or basketball coach with likely no teaching position or has a gig like teaching gym and being the faculty advisor for such a quiz bowl team is apart of what keeps them employed by the school district. This is the case with a few of the schools in our area.

In Ohio, on the statewide level, the traditionally strong programs are coached by Social Studies teachers (like Copley, Fisher Catholic, and Tippecanoe). I know the coaches of Northmont, Olmsted Falls, Solon and company are teachers, I'm not sure what they teach though. I personally don't know any quiz bowl coaches in Ohio that are math teachers.

IIRC, Bob Weiser of Solon is a retired Math teacher.

This is correct. It makes me wonder though; how many quizbowl coaches are retired teachers?