Arkansas quiz bowl

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bdavery
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Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by bdavery »

Here is the Arkansas quizbowl bid announcement for this coming year.

Dear Sir or Madam:

The Arkansas Governor’s Quiz Bowl Association (AGQBA) is an alliance of Quiz Bowl coaches from around the state, with the goal of promoting academic team competition throughout the state and at all education levels. We are soliciting bids for junior high level and senior high level practice sets and tournament questions for the 2008-2009 Quiz Bowl season.

Toss-Up bids should include a sample of 10 questions per category, Bonus bids should include a sample of 10 4-part questions, and Lightning Round bids should include a sample of 10 rounds. All should include answers. A vendor may bid for all senior high questions in database format, toss-ups only, lightning rounds only, bonus only, or any combination of toss-ups, lightning rounds, and bonus. They may also bid in the same manner for junior high questions either as entire matches or a database.

Our specifications are enclosed. If you desire to bid on either or both levels, please respond to me at the above address with the required samples by April 28, 2008. The executive board plans to select the company (or companies) at our May 3rd meeting.


Should you have any questions, please call me at (501) 847-8996, or Carolyn Shry, State Director, at (479) 858-2210. If you prefer, my email is [email protected] or [email protected].


Thank you very much,

Rosalynn Chandler

AGQBA Question Chair



AGQBA Bid Specifications for 2008-2009

Senior High Level:

20 sets of practice questions will be provided by July 10th on disk in Word or Rich Text format and emailed in Word by this date.
A database of 2000 Toss-up questions labeled by category, 150 Bonus Rounds, and 100 Lightning Rounds will be provided by October 15th on disk in Word format and emailed in Word by this date.

The toss-up question mix for the practice sets will be as follows:
9 -11 History/Geography/Government/Economics
9 -11 Science
9 -11 Language/Literature
9 -11 Mathematics
3 – 5 Fine Arts
2 – 4 Philosophy/Mythology/Religion
2 – 4 Currents events/Sports/Pop Culture

Questions in each match MUST follow the outlined mix such that questions from each category are fairly equally distributed throughout each question set and within each round throughout the toss-up questions.
The sentence structure must rarely consist of more than 2 lines with NO severe hooks in the questions.
The interrogative needs to be stated clearly.
The printed format should list alternate answers, pronunciation, and the importance of articles in titles, surnames, etc. Math problems should be written out in words as well as stated in problem form.
The questions should be specific to one category, e.g., social studies questions should not also be literature questions.
No more than ½ of the math questions should be computational and no more than 2 of the science questions should be computational

Questions should be from the Arkansas state school curriculum as much as possible. The questions should be about pertinent information, not obscure.
The 60-second (lightning round) and bonus questions may be of varying levels of difficulty. They should include a good variety of academic disciplines.
There should be NO computational math in the 60-second round choices.
The 60-second round choices should be specific questions mostly from the core academic categories (the first 4 above). There should be VERY FEW questions based on letters of the alphabet or potpourri, sports, or pop culture. There should be NO questions based on television shows or characters, films or film characters, foods or cooking terms, foreign language phrases, or postal abbreviations. The questions should not be written in long sentences.

Bonus questions should have a category heading. Some bonus questions may be written so that the four choices are related, e.g., name the states that meet at the “four corners” region in the Western U.S., but most should be written so that the four parts stand alone, i.e., one answer should not depend on having answered the previous question correctly.

Tournament questions should be PRISTINE – not having previously been used in Arkansas or surrounding states. AGQBA will retain the rights to the questions at the end of the season.
These tournament questions shall not be sold by the question writer to other states until one (1) year after purchase by AGQBA.

Question sets should be formatted as follows:
Individual rounds should be labeled and separated on pages as follows: Round 1--Toss-Ups #1-20; Round 2—Toss-Ups #21-30; Round 2--Bonus Questions; Round 3--Lightning Rounds; Round 4--Toss-Ups #31-50. All pages of toss-ups should have 10 questions per page. No fewer than 8 extra toss-ups and labeled Extra Toss-Ups, one extra bonus question labeled as such, and one extra lightning round labeled as such, should be added at the end of each match.
Each Lightning Round should include a description in addition to the title.
Each Lightning Round category should include an extra (11th) question to be labeled as such.
NO “reworded” or “repeat” questions asked.

The same question category mix and specifications for questions should be followed for the database. The database should include extra toss-ups and lightning rounds as above, and one extra bonus question should be included per every four in the data base.

Junior High Level:

Same as the above specifications for Senior High Level, except in #2, either the same type database OR, alternately, 40 rounds of tournament questions is acceptable. The database or 40 rounds should be provided by October 15th. If providing the rounds of questions, the questions should progress slightly in level of difficulty from one level of eight sets to the next. The 60-second round choices should be of comparable difficulty within a given match but in different academic disciplines. Bonus questions should also be in different disciplines and of equal difficulty in a given match.

Questions should be delivered to Carolyn Shry, AGQBA State Director, at [email protected] by the aforementioned dates. The AGQBA mailing address is P.O. Box 1621, Russellville, AR 72811. If a paper copy is requested (or needed) then it shall be sent via certified or registered mail. AGQBA reserves the right to impose a 20% penalty should any violation of the above listed stipulations occur.
Bryce Avery
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http://www.averyenterprises.net/blog
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Byko »

Wow. I can see that they've changed some things since the two years I had the contract based on some things they didn't like that I did:

1. So now questions are rarely longer than 2 lines, not 3.
2. Not being from Arkansas, I'm not well-versed in the Arkansas state school curriculum.
3. I think the description of answers being "pertinent information, not obscure" is an awfully difficult requirement to define and meet.
4. Good luck putting together something like 200 lightning rounds (even more than the 150 I had to do in a year) keeping to very specific core categories without doing some of the things they mention. I guess they basically don't want interdisciplinary lightning rounds. Sadly, that may be unfair to teams to remove those.
5. Also, good luck keeping those lightning rounds parts substantive and "pertinent information, not obscure" as well as really short.

I was really encouraged by the positive response I had gotten from the Arkansas teams my wife and I had met at NAQT in the past and how they thought the questions were a good step up for the state. It's too bad it seems a state that has produced many good teams is taking a step backward, though. I suppose this is one way to try to narrow the gap between the top teams and the rest of the field, but I'd say this is far from the best way.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Tegan »

Byko wrote:I was really encouraged by the positive response I had gotten from the Arkansas teams my wife and I had met at NAQT in the past and how they thought the questions were a good step up for the state. It's too bad it seems a state that has produced many good teams is taking a step backward, though. I suppose this is one way to try to narrow the gap between the top teams and the rest of the field, but I'd say this is far from the best way.
This is a real shame! Like in Illinois, we ca npass all the rules we want, but until good questions become the norm, it is hard to get rid of them. The hope is that as more and more question companies go out of business that write these questions, states will be left with little choice but to accept the good ones.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by STPickrell »

"Tournament questions should be PRISTINE – not having previously been used in Arkansas or surrounding states. AGQBA will retain the rights to the questions at the end of the season. These tournament questions shall not be sold by the question writer to other states until one (1) year after purchase by AGQBA."

I don't remember this being in there the year Avery and I bid for Arkansas.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Byko »

STPickrell wrote:"Tournament questions should be PRISTINE – not having previously been used in Arkansas or surrounding states. AGQBA will retain the rights to the questions at the end of the season. These tournament questions shall not be sold by the question writer to other states until one (1) year after purchase by AGQBA."

I don't remember this being in there the year Avery and I bid for Arkansas.
The first part about them being pristine was definitely there the two years that AI bid and got the AGQBA contract. The part about retaining rights was in there, but in the conditions of our bid, we had stated the retainment of the rights to the questions. Regardless, we followed the standards outlined here in the end.

Still, the frustration regarding requirements like these that end up forcing the creation of what we generally consider to be bad questions is one of many reasons why AI is out of the question writing business and will pretty much be out of existence entirely by the end of this season. This doesn't mean I'm disappearing from quiz bowl entirely, though I will be taking a step back to spend time on other priorities and pursuits. But I'll still moderate at tournaments and keep in touch with folks, plus the ratings system won't be going away either.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by STPickrell »

Byko wrote:Still, the frustration regarding requirements like these that end up forcing the creation of what we generally consider to be bad questions is one of many reasons why AI is out of the question writing business and will pretty much be out of existence entirely by the end of this season. This doesn't mean I'm disappearing from quiz bowl entirely, though I will be taking a step back to spend time on other priorities and pursuits. But I'll still moderate at tournaments and keep in touch with folks, plus the ratings system won't be going away either.
It's a shame to see you going, Byko. Good luck with these other hobbies of which you speak, perhaps you might share a few of them with me. :)
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Stained Diviner »

That's a lot of questions. Anybody willing share an approximate amount of money somebody might get paid for writing all of them?
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by STPickrell »

ReinsteinD wrote:That's a lot of questions. Anybody willing share an approximate amount of money somebody might get paid for writing all of them?
Avery and I joined forces three years ago -- basically, I would produce lots of VHSL tossups, he would pare them to 3 lines (or was that my job? I forget) and add bonuses and category rounds.

We offered $50 a round and were rejected.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Byko »

STPickrell wrote:We offered $50 a round and were rejected.
Wow. I won't state specifics, but we offered more than that and were accepted for our two years. For all the trouble it was, though, it almost wasn't worth it, and we could easily have lost money on the whole thing.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by STPickrell »

Byko wrote:
STPickrell wrote:We offered $50 a round and were rejected.
Wow. I won't state specifics, but we offered more than that and were accepted for our two years. For all the trouble it was, though, it almost wasn't worth it, and we could easily have lost money on the whole thing.
granted, we were going to use VHSL tossups from 2004-05 in the AGQBA matches. that might've dinged us.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by mujason »

Any chance the Missouri bid announcement will be posted? I might consider bidding (either by myself or as part of an alliance) if MSHSAA can be convinced to let an in-stater write questions.
Jason Mueller, former University of Missouri player
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

Did you notice that that rule is a lie Bill Stallard made up in his head?
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by AKKOLADE »

Deesy Does It wrote:Did you notice that that rule is a lie Bill Stallard made up in his head?
Huh?
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by AndyShootsAndyScores »

leftsaidfred wrote:
Deesy Does It wrote:Did you notice that that rule is a lie Bill Stallard made up in his head?
Huh?
I think he was referring to Jason's complaint about in-staters not being able to bid for question writing.
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Re: Arkansas quiz bowl

Post by STPickrell »

Deesy Does It wrote:Did you notice that that rule is a lie Bill Stallard made up in his head?
i was told not to include Missouri-based personnel in my "official" MSHSAA questions. (regular season was ok) There is a chance I might have misconstrued something, but that is the message I walked off with this fall.
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