New Team at Loyola University Chicago

[RamblingManRusso]

Hey everybody, my name is Matt Russo and I love quiz bowl and am really excited to try and get a team started at my school. It's been a pretty hectic first semester and I haven't really been able to keep track of where there are tournaments and getting the team off the ground. I would appreciate if anyone could give me some tips on starting out, some information on upcoming tournaments, etc. Thanks!

[Edward Elric]

Hey Matt, My name is Mike and I play/captain the team at University of Illinois-Chicago. It's good seeing another Chicago team pop up! I'm in a similar situation to you as this is one of the first semesters that we as a team are trying to attend tournaments as a full team (re: not Rom playing solo). My first advice would be to try to talk with student organizations and see if they can sponsor quizbowl. We got kind of lucky and UIC Quizbowl is sponsored by student organizations so they pay for most of our tournaments. Also, I would try to set up practices in the first couple of weeks in January by advertising around campus. I'm not sure if you guys have a buzzer set to practice on, but if you don't you could always swing by UIC for a practice.

Tournament wise: There are a few good tournaments coming up in February that are "Regular Difficulty" that may be good for a starting team, though some may be fairly difficult. Those tournaments are NAQT SCT http://naqt.com/sct/hosts.jsp (which is going to be hosted by UChicago), Penn Bowl at Northwestern http://hsquizbowl.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12331&p=231152&hilit=penn+bowl#p228916(Though the field is full and a waitlist has started so It may be difficult to get in) and ACF Regionals at UIUC http://hsquizbowl.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12511&view=unread#unread. There is also going to be MUT (Minnesota Underground Tournament) http://hsquizbowl.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12309&start=0&hilit=MUT that will be a more appropriate difficulty for newer teams that will be hosted sometime in March.

Anyways, If you have any questions shoot me an email. I hope to see you guys at future tournaments!

[Papa's in the House]

Hello, Matt, and welcome to the QB forums. You can find the answer to pretty much any question you might have about quiz bowl somewhere on these forums, but here are a few good starting threads:

-Some advice on forming the club itself
-Some advice on creating a constitution/bylaws
-Some advice on writing packets/questions in general (Note that you won't be required to write packets/questions right away since you're a new player)
-An introduction to the quiz bowl alphabet soup
-Peoples thoughts about buzzers
-Also check out the "Theory/Newbie Help" forum

As for tournaments, there's (in order of when they will occur):
-BARGE (though this might be too early since you're just starting up)
-SCT (held at the University of Chicago this year in your region. I highly recommend attending this tournament since it is more difficulty appropriate for new teams, just don't get discouraged when you play some veteran quiz bowl teams)
-Penn Bowl
-ACF Regionals

There are other tournaments, but this is a good introduction to what's coming up in the first couple of months of the coming semester. UIUC will be hosting a MUT mirror later in the semester that is probably more difficulty appropriate for newer teams.

EDIT: Seems like I was beaten to the punch on some of this

[Awehrman]

Hi Matt,

Go see Catlin Wojtkowski in the SAGA office downstairs basement of CFSU, and tell him Ellen Wehrman sent you. My wife Ellen was formerly the student activities coordinator at LUC. She tells me that you will need 5 members (including yourself) and an advisor. This link outlines the process, but Catlin will walk you through it: http://www.luc.edu/saga/new_organizations.shtml

She says that you could easily get funding for a buzzer system, question sets, and for hosting tournaments. Funding for travel to tournaments will be next to impossible (something Ellen tried unsuccessfully to change), so you will have to fundraise and host tournaments. She says that she routinely had 1-2 students a year ask about a quizbowl team at Loyola but that it never came together. So if you post flyers and make your club known, there should be some interest.

Good luck!

[RamblingManRusso]

Hey Mr. Wehrman, I have a pretty good amount of people interested in joining so that shouldn't be an issue, however, I'm not sure who I should ask to be an adviser. I was wondering if you had any ideas on who you feel would be interested in becoming our adviser? I appreciate the help, and it's good to know that we have the support of our school behind us! Again, thank you!

[Awehrman]

Probably the best route would be to ask Catlin. He should have a list of names of potential advisors--faculty/staff who want to advise student orgs or people who are good advisors who would be willing to take on more.

[Papa's in the House]

She says that you could easily get funding for... question sets

You can find lots of old free packets on the collegiate quiz bowl packet archive.