CavsFan2k10 wrote:Didn't go through all the pages, however having seen some of the It's Academic (DC) tapings on YouTube, I must say even though the format probably isn't the best, I absolutely admire the glamour and the overall atmosphere of the show. I wouldn't mind personally playing on it at least once just to have the feeling I'm on a 60's quiz bowl show.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:CavsFan2k10 wrote:Didn't go through all the pages, however having seen some of the It's Academic (DC) tapings on YouTube, I must say even though the format probably isn't the best, I absolutely admire the glamour and the overall atmosphere of the show. I wouldn't mind personally playing on it at least once just to have the feeling I'm on a 60's quiz bowl show.
no dont
CavsFan2k10 wrote:Didn't go through all the pages, however having seen some of the It's Academic (DC) tapings on YouTube, I must say even though the format probably isn't the best, I absolutely admire the glamour and the overall atmosphere of the show. I wouldn't mind personally playing on it at least once just to have the feeling I'm on a 60's quiz bowl show.
Isaacbh wrote:It's Academic does a decent job of making itself look like it's awesome on TV, but the tapings are much smaller affairs than you would think and a lot of the tech and stuff is outdated. They still pull off a good-looking show, but actually being on it sort of shatters the illusion.
Also, yeah, the questions. Eck.
Wurzel-Flummery wrote:I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
CavsFan2k10 wrote:Didn't go through all the pages, however having seen some of the It's Academic (DC) tapings on YouTube, I must say even though the format probably isn't the best, I absolutely admire the glamour and the overall atmosphere of the show. I wouldn't mind personally playing on it at least once just to have the feeling I'm on a 60's quiz bowl show.
CavsFan2k10 wrote:Out of curiosity, what is the prize for winning It's Academic (DC)? Aside from bragging rights, is there a monetary award for the school or scholarship awarding?
Anonymous wrote:naqt is much worse than plagiarism could ever hope to be
rpond wrote:That sounds like quite a bit less than for The Challenge here. $2000 for winning a region (Suffolk, Nassau, and Westchester have 32 teams each, NYC (just Bronx and Brooklyn) and Connecticut have 16 teams each, New Jersey has 48 teams), $10000 for winning the final game. Also, every student who makes it to the final game (winning and losing sides) gets $500.
Anonymous wrote:naqt is much worse than plagiarism could ever hope to be
Prof.Whoopie wrote:Wurzel-Flummery wrote:I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
ANSWER: at real tournaments [accept playing actual quizbowl and equivalents]
Wurzel-Flummery wrote:Prof.Whoopie wrote:Wurzel-Flummery wrote:I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
ANSWER: at real tournaments [accept playing actual quizbowl and equivalents]
Well, people like me and Arun wouldn't be on the team if it weren't for the TV show because I would have never known about the team and therefore would have never recruited Arun. My point is that the team wouldn't have had some of the players it had without the name recognition the TV show gave it.
In 2006, a victorious Richard Montgomery team led by Chris Ray was given a prop trophy to hold up at the end of the match. Unfortunately, the screws on the trophy were not as tight as they could have been and one of the handles was yanked off as it was lifted triumphantly. I don't remember if they did a second take or not.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:Wurzel-Flummery wrote:
I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
ANSWER: at real tournaments [accept playing actual quizbowl and equivalents]
Neg wrote:-5
Nobody at QO, other than the people already on our team, seems at all interested in anything intelligent or enlightening, so the show isn't really a good recruiting tool for us. :( Giving out money is probably the only useful function it has, as we can spend it on tournaments that aren't dumb.
DumbJaques wrote:how is It's Ac some obstacle in this effort
Neg wrote:Giving out money is probably the only useful function it has
Matt Weiner wrote:How many teams actually got prize money from IA?
Matt Weiner wrote:How many of them actually used it to attend real tournaments?
Matt Weiner wrote:How is it not a negative impact on the regular circuit to have IA tape on Saturdays and to consistently see schools schedule their fake tournaments against real ones in the same metro area?
Matt Weiner wrote:How is the fact that one school managed to play in both worlds comparable to the dozens of schools who show hostility to good questions and good formats because the TV show is all they care about?
Matt Weiner wrote:The reason attendance is down in DC is because of general problems with high school quizbowl including difficulty explosion and the total collapse of institutional continuity at just about every program leading to an inability to communicate effectively or, more often, AT ALL with most non-HSQB-reading teams.
Matt Weiner wrote:Combine this with the fact that the few people who have tried to deal with this problem have been stymied due to various bad reasons.
Matt Weiner wrote:Given that IA itself has as many teams as ever and how few teams actually drew their budgets from consistently winning on the show, I don't see any water to the argument that a change in IA politics has much to do with it.
To believe in “It’s Academic” is to believe in good things, in solid things like right answers, certainty, sportsmanship and loyalty.
Swank diet wrote:Speaking of It's Academic... check this story out.To believe in “It’s Academic” is to believe in good things, in solid things like right answers, certainty, sportsmanship and loyalty.
Special appearances by Chris Manners and Raynell Cooper. You can email the reporter via this form to express your opinion if you don't believe in good things the way she does.
Swank diet wrote:Speaking of It's Academic... check this story out.To believe in “It’s Academic” is to believe in good things, in solid things like right answers, certainty, sportsmanship and loyalty.
Special appearances by Chris Manners and Raynell Cooper. You can email the reporter via this form to express your opinion if you don't believe in good things the way she does.
Carangoides ciliarius wrote:I understand the hostility towards It's Academic, because Delaware teams had to suffer through a similar tournament called the Academic Challenge (the 4-quarter style) for many years sponsored by Texaco, Comcast, and probably other relatively large companies in the past.
Comcast completely dropped their sponsorship in 2008 and the show was cancelled. There is absolutely no question in my mind that this, even though i hated this tournament more than i could ever express has been an overall crushing loss for Delaware.
This free tournament that Comcast sponsored - which gave away $300 to two teams, $600 to two teams, $1000 to one team, $1500 to one team, and $5000 to one team, and aired at least 10 matches on television - drew up to 20 teams from a very small state that only has about 50 legitimate high schools. Now, when a team like CR attempts to run a tournament, we have one team from our entire county that attends... and just two more schools from New Castle County. Whereas some teams that never travel to legitimate nationals in Maryland can pull 30 or 40 teams to a terrible tournament, we couldn't even draw 10 to ours last weekend as we're trying to raise money for next year.
I would do anything to have the Comcast tournament back. I would even have our kids play it and earn no money at all. If it helped recruit teams and facilitate interest in bad quizbowl, that is still better than no quizbowl at all.
Neg wrote:Swank diet wrote:Speaking of It's Academic... check this story out.To believe in “It’s Academic” is to believe in good things, in solid things like right answers, certainty, sportsmanship and loyalty.
Special appearances by Chris Manners and Raynell Cooper. You can email the reporter via this form to express your opinion if you don't believe in good things the way she does.
The "Euclid" thing was a misquote and was actually said by my teammate, Sean Reidy. I don't know who Euclid is.
The problem is that IA competes with real tournaments. I don't think anyone can dispute that it is an effective recruiting tool that could have a good influence on the real quizbowl circuit by finding players/teams. But it won't peacefully coexist, as both the show and the fake tournaments steal dates from real quizbowl. People want to do both things? Fine. It's not the real quizbowl circuit that's standing in the way of that. IA needs to change to allow for peaceful co-existence.
As long as this board maintains (or certain individuals on this board maintain) a hostile tone and attitude toward those who like or prefer questions which have some sort of element of speed in them, many of those schools will continue to not come to this board. In effect, such tone and attitude hurt quiz bowl in all forms. Perhaps instead of trying to tell people how wrong they are, one might achieve more by just stating an opinion if one feels necessary and then allowing the members to settle where they may.
DumbJaques wrote: But in terms of scheduling issues, I guess I'm not sure what you're thinking of as an alternative. I'm not sure the show even could do anything but tape a handful of games every Saturday, just due to the nature of their model.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:DumbJaques wrote: But in terms of scheduling issues, I guess I'm not sure what you're thinking of as an alternative. I'm not sure the show even could do anything but tape a handful of games every Saturday, just due to the nature of their model.
I've considered this point before, and I wonder if some Richmond people would be willing to explain to the board how Battle of the Brains works. It is my understanding that they tape their show on weekday afternoons/evenings, thereby obviating the need for people to miss real tournaments for a TV show.
JamesIV wrote:I think it's worth considering the perspective of an outsider to the community, a school administrator, let's say. A pyramidal tournament is relatively expensive. There's next-to no exposure, even for a victorious team. There's no audience, there's not television time. For someone who doesn't care about the questions, it's a no-brainer. I'm not saying it as an argument for doing something like It's Academic, but rather as an explanation of why it can be hard to sell people on transferring energies towards pyramidal.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:A few years ago, I sent an email to the It's Ac people wondering (among a few other things) whether or not they would consider moving to a weekday model, and perhaps seeing if they could get some advice from BoB on how to do it. The only line of their reply addressing this concern was (copy/pasted word for word) "We obviously cannot tape on a weekday." I did not find this response particularly illuminating, and so I wonder if it might be worth pursuing further.
Howard wrote:There's no reason any tournament in the Baltimore-DC area aimed toward the average quizbowl team shouldn't be able to draw in excess of 30 teams.
Matt Weiner wrote:JamesIV wrote:I think it's worth considering the perspective of an outsider to the community, a school administrator, let's say. A pyramidal tournament is relatively expensive. There's next-to no exposure, even for a victorious team. There's no audience, there's not television time. For someone who doesn't care about the questions, it's a no-brainer. I'm not saying it as an argument for doing something like It's Academic, but rather as an explanation of why it can be hard to sell people on transferring energies towards pyramidal.
True. On the other hand, no one outside of the participants cares about the following things with no audience that are not on TV: Model UN, chess club, pretty much any sport except basketball and football at certain schools, robotics, etc. If good quizbowl had 10% of the success of those things we'd be in good shape. no?
JamesIV wrote:Matt Weiner wrote:JamesIV wrote:I think it's worth considering the perspective of an outsider to the community, a school administrator, let's say. A pyramidal tournament is relatively expensive. There's next-to no exposure, even for a victorious team. There's no audience, there's not television time. For someone who doesn't care about the questions, it's a no-brainer. I'm not saying it as an argument for doing something like It's Academic, but rather as an explanation of why it can be hard to sell people on transferring energies towards pyramidal.
True. On the other hand, no one outside of the participants cares about the following things with no audience that are not on TV: Model UN, chess club, pretty much any sport except basketball and football at certain schools, robotics, etc. If good quizbowl had 10% of the success of those things we'd be in good shape. no?
I completely agree. In that way, I would say It's Ac is definitely a handicap, in that an administrator, when it's time to start cutting expenditures, etc., would point to It's Academic and say, "Well, that's obviously much more valuable as an experience than [insert pyramidal tournament here]." It's Academic, being big and shiny, as it were, has a draw that overshadows good quizbowl. I think if you asked the average high school principal, let's say, I imagine he or she would say, "We give just as much support to quizbowl as we do other activities" and it's just hard to convince them that the bells and whistles don't matter.
There are probably a bunch of other teams like Quince Orchard on there, who maybe did real tournaments years ago but drifted away for whatever reason and are now off the map but could be brought back easily if they just found out about the existence of a fuller circuit right in their backyard.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:Wurzel-Flummery wrote:I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
ANSWER: at real tournaments [accept playing actual quizbowl and equivalents]
drno wrote:Prof.Whoopie wrote:Wurzel-Flummery wrote:I don't know where RM's team (or most any team around here, for that matter) would be if it weren't for It's Ac
ANSWER: at real tournaments [accept playing actual quizbowl and equivalents]
Now, attending a local IS tournament is a prerequisite to appearing on the show.
Carangoides ciliarius wrote:That is pretty amazing, but i would bet anything that something like that might never happen for It's Academic.
Wurzel-Flummery wrote:Carangoides ciliarius wrote:That is pretty amazing, but i would bet anything that something like that might never happen for It's Academic.
If there's ever a job opening for producer of "It's Academic," I'm going to find any and every former quizbowler who is even remotely qualified and force them to apply.
Isaacbh wrote:...you're deluding yourself if you honestly believe that a majority of coaches in the DC area enjoy playing both pyramidal and IA quizbowl. Most coaches that do this are the exceptions, not the rules, and some of the teams that successfully compete in both either have no coaches or are basically going against their coaches by playing pyramidal.
Isaacbh wrote:Pretending that tournaments like this have implicit value based on the number of teams that attend is silly, and is the opposite conclusion we should be drawing from this. We should be asking WHY the hell Green Eggs and Hammond is pulling in 30 teams, who these teams are, and why they aren't playing pyramidal, if they don't already. I think we'll find an even split of teams that are actively anti-pyramidal and teams that really haven't been courted hard enough.
Isaacbh wrote:The only truly beneficial thing I can think of that It's Ac does is help recruiting, but even that benefit could be rendered irrelevant if quizbowl raised its profile to It's Ac levels.
Isaacbh wrote:People should stop saying "Well, at least 162 teams are answering questions" and start saying "Why aren't all those teams answering good questions?"
Matt Weiner wrote:The problem is that IA competes with real tournaments.
Matt Weiner wrote:But it won't peacefully coexist, as both the show and the fake tournaments steal dates from real quizbowl. People want to do both things? Fine. It's not the real quizbowl circuit that's standing in the way of that. IA needs to change to allow for peaceful co-existence.
Matt Weiner wrote:It's eminently doable, the problem is that IA has no motivation to care.
DumbJacques wrote:I'm not sure the show even could do anything but tape a handful of games every Saturday, just due to the nature of their model.
Prof.Whoopie wrote:The only line of their reply addressing this concern was (copy/pasted word for word) "We obviously cannot tape on a weekday." I did not find this response particularly illuminating, and so I wonder if it might be worth pursuing further.
Frater Taciturnus wrote:Usually these tapings are something like a "1:30" and a "2:30" taping which is done in the same room that they film the local news in at WTVR.
RyuAqua wrote:Do we know for certain that It's Ac is the only thing that ever goes on in that room? That particular NBC studio (Studio A) may not be available during weekdays due to other taping commitments.
Matt Weiner wrote:On the other hand, no one outside of the participants cares about the following things with no audience that are not on TV: Model UN, chess club, pretty much any sport except basketball and football at certain schools, robotics, etc. If good quizbowl had 10% of the success of those things we'd be in good shape. no?
DumbJacques wrote:I don't for a second buy John's argument that rightly chastising someone for failing as an educator is somehow the problem....
DumbJacques wrote:For one thing, you're presenting things as if "certain individuals on this board" (I wonder who you mean) are declaring that they've found the best way to do things, and are squaring off in a death match against everyone's freedom to choose. I take rather extreme offense to this (and I don't even think I'm one of the people you mean), because for me this IS a problem of people being able to make their own choices.
DumbJacques wrote:Specifically, I'm talking about the kids who are told they must attend a taping (even as an alternate!) instead of a tournament they'd rather play or face being banned from the team. I'm talking about 16 and 17 year-olds who have to pay out of pocket and recruit on their own because their coaches are personally insecure about attending tournaments their teams may do poorly at. I'm talking about kids who are bullied and insulted by supposed educators because they've lobbied to play pyramidal sets at practice. And you'd better believe I'd have just as big a problem if kids were being forced to miss a chance to go on tv because their coach believed an NAQT set was more important, but I'm not aware of that actually happening.
DumbJacques wrote:Is it somehow Matt Weiner's fault that when ER (despite having one of the most tenured coaches in the game) showed up at our May tournament two years ago, their captain told me "we didn't even know there were tournaments?
DumbJacques wrote:The marginal drain on tournament attendance from the show could be ridiculously offset if it became a vehicle for directly encouraging circuit participation by the 60-70% of teams who do speed formats and nothing else.
Jeremy Gibbs Freesy Does It wrote:I think it would be really easy for you all to coordinate the bulk of your hosting calendar by the beginning of the school year and put it all into a calendar. Given that It's Academic posts the names of every team on the show, it should then be a fairly straightforward, if time intensive task for the hosts in D.C. to search around on all those school websites for the name of an It's Ac coach, and then send them emails and letters with that calendar of major events to try and advertise to them that they can be part of a whole other circuit of events.
Howard wrote:Matt Weiner wrote:Combine this with the fact that the few people who have tried to deal with this problem have been stymied due to various bad reasons.
I'd be interested in hearing what these "various bad reasons" are.
This isn't my argument. Maybe we have different definitions of what "failing as an educator" entails. On my team, all students who are willing to participate are welcome. They're allowed to decide the format(s) on which they'd like to focus. They're encouraged to set their own goals and work toward achieving them. I'll advise them on the necessary actions to achieve their goals, but with near zero exception, I won't force them to undertake any particular activity. They each own their successes and failures and learn from these while they're learning some academic material as well. I hope you don't think this qualifies as "failing as an educator" in the high school realm. If you do, then I think you and I have a rather large philosophical divide as to what's really important in high school education.
This is indeed the general impression I get, and you're right that you're not one of the people to whom I'm referring. You're also right there's one particular person who seems to be leading the charge, but there's also nothing to be gained from naming the person, even if the majority of us know who that person is. I certainly don't intend to be offensive with this, so if you're offended, it does make me wonder if I'm a little off base.
On the other hand, I know of a handful of coaches that have boycotted certain organizers' tournaments because they believe those organizers have done things they consider so odious they think it's better to not provide their team an opportunity to play than to support those organizers. And I'd say the majority of these coaches are not what most people would consider radical. At the very least, I don't consider them radical. And I consider myself fairly radical.
The producers have actually expressed interest in teams being active in other tournaments. Because they know my team participates in many tournaments, they (with my permission) give my contact information to new teams, and I receive several e-mails each year from new teams looking for tournaments. I give each of them links to this board and NAQT's website as well as a list of tournaments I know about.
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