The Quizbowl Resource Center

cchiego

I just made a post on GPQB about the best way to invite teams to quizbowl tournaments. In drawing up the post, I provided some sample templates that I've used in the past to send to new-to-quizbowl schools and schools that have a team of some kind that's not quite pyramidal quizbowl. You can find th...

cchiego

We're keeping track of PA tournaments here on GPQB and will cross-list nearby NJ tournaments. Eastern PA tournaments are definitely within driving distance (if not public transit) for many NJ/NY teams. Keep in mind too that there are likely going to be a lot of new teams this year in the area and th...

cchiego

Really though, our comparatively low participation at pyramidal events has less to do with what Ben said and more to do with a lack of funds and school administration red tape. You can be the change you wish to see in the world by 1. hosting tournaments on good pyramidal questions to raise $$ and 2...

cchiego

After a two-year hiatus, Seton Hall Prep will be returning to the circuit next year. Please include us on any and all announcements as they arise. This is great to hear! Hopefully the NJ circuit will be even more vibrant next year too with the Seton Hall Prep teams back on the circuit. Speaking of ...

cchiego

Alex and Jaya have great points above. Here's another perspective. When I write geography (and when I studied geography when I played), I start from maps. All kinds of maps. Maps showing physical geography and topography, maps of cities with historic sites and neighborhoods on them, maps with racial...

cchiego

Since someone in another thread indicated a desire for more quizbowl podcasts, I figure I'd update this by pointing out that we've recorded several other episodes that ought to be of interest to general quizbowl audiences. Keep following us over the summer too--we have a number of other interviews p...

cchiego

Two suggestions that might be relevant to the AL situation and other states with lots of NAQT tournaments taken up already: It looks like a number of tournaments in AL on NAQT sets don't go that many rounds (Buckhorn for instance on IS-148 only has 8 rounds and Covenant Christian on IS-152 only had ...

cchiego

All of the above are great points. A few others: One administrative thing you can start working on right now is ensuring that you get your club re-registered for next year in time to reserve space for practices. This sounds simple, but there are often deadlines and a few hoops to jump through that c...

cchiego

The larger question is how do we help smaller colleges like Furman who may have few, if any former high school players as recruits, maintain their teams. Philadelphia's a good example of this: there have been teams at Swarthmore, Haverford, Villanova, and Bryn Mawr at various points in the past deca...

cchiego

So I guess my question is, how do tournaments usually get enough good moderators? We have a few teachers here with a quizbowl past, but I don't think there are enough. Would I just hold a training session for volunteers beforehand or something else? Thanks for any replies. You might want to start r...

cchiego

I first noticed this happening at ACE Camp a few summers ago and now it's fairly regular (i.e. once or twice a tournament in matches that I've been reading) at college-level tournaments, plus I've seen it happen at HS nationals as well. Here's how it works: a player rings in on a tossup and then sta...

cchiego

I'm not sure if a league would be the best format necessarily for East TN. Leagues are often time and travel-intensive and seem to work better in a single large urban area where the travel time is relatively low. Something small that's centered in Knoxville might work, but it seems like just getting...

cchiego

it just really feels bad to consistently come up short and to fail at having success in Quizbowl. There's an issue in thinking that you have to "win something big" to have a successful quizbowl career, which can lead to somewhat insane studying schedules and burnout along the lines of thi...

cchiego

. If your fields are always full to capacity, then..yes, there's no financial reason to recruit more teams, but I don't see how that changes with a negative mirror fee. Sure, so recruiting a new team without a negative mirror fee and with a discount is more like a $70 (entry fee) -10 (mirror fee) -...

cchiego

I had a much longer post get eaten, but I'll just address the major points raised and correct a few misperceptions: "high entry fees" are not the primary reason that schools that are aware of quizbowl don't play; "lack of coach interest" is way, WAY higher up the list. So this pr...

cchiego

Outreach is expensive both in terms of time and, too often, finances for TDs. It's expensive to give big discounts to new teams (though these discounts are key, in my opinion, to reducing the financial barrier for new teams) and such teams often require more hand-holding from the TD in explaining th...

cchiego

Revolutions , by Mike Duncan, is superb. Excellent histories of the English Civil War, the French Revolution, and now the Haitian Revolution (current season). The American Revolution was a bit disappointing, but that could be because I'm most familiar with that case. He's also the original History ...

cchiego

Loath as I am to critique a rare pyramidal tournament in the Memphis area (at my alma mater, no less), there seem to be some issues with what happened here. Is there a reason most teams seemed to only play 2 or 3 matches in the stats? I hope everyone played at least 5--otherwise you can't seriously ...

cchiego

Congratulations to High Tech A and Friends Select A for winning the open and novice divisions, respectively, of the 2015 Quaker Fall Open. The final standings for each division were as follows: Open Division: 1. High Tech A 2. Wilmington Charter A 3. Great Valley A 4. East Brunswick A Novice Divisio...

cchiego

Ryan is exactly right about New Jersey's system, which as far as I can tell works very well. If your goal is to make sure that the most schools who want to attend can attend -- including teams that aren't on the boards all the time! -- then the best way to do it is to implement a quota system, not ...

cchiego

So I'm not sure what the demand for tournaments and supply of moderators is like in Virginia, but I've seen an excess of demand and an lack of supply for tournaments here on the border of the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast. This means that there are lots of teams interested, and so every team that "...

cchiego

Registering for a tournament means: "We have gotten clear commitments from all our players that they are free that weekend, and are willing and able to attend the tournament. Confirming for a tournament in response to an email from the TD after registering means: "We have talked about thi...

cchiego

If you don't try to start a team, there's basically a 0 percent chance there will be a lasting quizbowl team at your school. If you do try, there's at least a decent chance that something gets started and lasts. Plus, you get to play quizbowl along the way. Follow Reinstein's advice and just do it, ...

cchiego

Middlesex county academy would like to register 2 teams. This is a bit late to sign up, but there's a chance we could fit y'all if teams drop or we get a few more moderators to commit. Email us at pennquizbowl@gmail.com and we can discuss more. Right now we have confirmed a 34-team field with 17 te...

cchiego

All the C and D teams on the waitlist are now into the field. Right now, we have 17-18 staffers and 28 teams confirmed (with 5 teams from the waitlist pending), but we could always use another staffer or two if there are people out there. If any additional teams are interested in registering, you mu...

cchiego

Part of this is a good thing; quizbowl has recognized that you need experienced, capable readers to make a tournament run well and you can't just throw in a random coach/parent/roommate if you want to finish a round in under 35 minutes. While it may be harder to get readers now, the readers we do ge...

cchiego

After a succession of drops (after reminding teams about the SATs), the waitlist is now emptied and I'm waiting to hear back on confirmation from a few more teams to confirm their spots in the field. While I'm not ready to re-open registration, I am more confident in our moderator numbers so we will...

cchiego

Also, I thought the first (or maybe second) line drop of UF6 during the Iran nuclear deal tossup was kinda weird. Like, I understand that you can't just outright say "uranium hexafluoride" so early, but trying to disguise it as some meaningless alphanumeric abbreviation felt a little too ...

cchiego

3. Benedetto Croce (CROW-chay) claimed that the philosophy of language and this branch of philosophy are the same thing, since this branch of philosophy is the "science of expression." The third volume of The World as Will and Representation discusses this topic and claims that the object...

cchiego

11. Preparations for one of these actions included the installation of 150 Ponderosa Pines at Frenchman Flat. One of these events affected the cast of Dick Powell's Genghis Khan movie, The Conqueror, including John Wayne. One of these events named Sedan carved a still-extant rock formation and the ...

cchiego

SEALs question made it clear we were talking about a special forces military organization early on and you only had to wait to until location-determining nouns were dropped until you had a relatively certain idea of the answer Is this really "fraudable" then? Getting an early buzz require...

cchiego

Field has been capped and filled (6 weeks out!) at 30. We will expand to 36 (18 open/18 novice) only if we can secure additional competent moderators. I suspect we will be able to, but can't be assured of that right now. I am also anticipating at least a few drops, but am working to pre-emptively ma...

cchiego

They're a huge distraction as a reader, they're rarely helpful on words I don't know how to pronounce, and they're a waste of time to include in editing that ought to be spent working on grammar and avoiding repeats. Splitting up long words and phrases is fine and helpful, but adding more gibberish ...

cchiego

After the next few registrations, I am going to have to put a soft cap on the field until we can secure the services of more moderators. Our capacity is 36 teams based on the number of rooms we have. Our moderator capacity right now is 24-28 teams, so our ability to fully expand the field depends on...

cchiego

One thread that I really enjoyed some time ago was the one discussing about going to graduate school; that brought together lots of smart people with different perspectives on academia. Yes, more of this. I'd also be curious to hear from coaches at various types of high schools about their experien...

cchiego

Field Update as of 11/23 Teams in bold have confirmed; if your team is not bolded, please email us to confirm *Denotes first-ever pyramidal weekend tournament Registered: Charter (4/0) Great Valley (2/1) PALCS (1/0) Gunston (1/1) Central Bucks East (1/1) East Brunswick (2/0) George Washington Carver...

cchiego

Ben Herman and I have started a podcast for Greater Pennsylvania QuizBowl (GPQB). We are alternating podcasts directed at the Greater Pennsylvania region (team rankings and previews and such) with topic-based podcasts that should be of interest to the larger quizbowl community. All of our podcasts a...

cchiego

The haters in the comments section on the Jeopardy! Facebook page are amusing. I definitely like the people who can recognize and respect that Matt's a straight-up master, though. Don't check Twitter if you think the FB ones are bad. It's pretty clear that a significant chunk of people watch Jeopar...

cchiego

Just to make it clear, Penn has moved our CALI mirror (rechristened the "Quaker Fall Open") to December 5th due to room reservation issues.

cchiego

The Penn Quizbowl Team, a student organization at the University of Pennsylvania, is pleased to announce our Quaker Fall Open (QFO), to be held on December 5th on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, PA. Location and Time: The tournament will take place on December 5th on th...

cchiego

Here's a guide to attending quizbowl tournaments. This should give you an idea of the registration process and what to expect at the tournaments themselves. We also have a basic overview of how to start a team as well as a brief guide to some resources to help a team improve. You can also take a loo...

cchiego

I don’t think much will change: not because we want to resist change, but because we see very little that needs to be changed. However, if members of the community have suggestions, I know that I will be more than willing to listen to what you all have to say. In that spirit, a few suggestions on t...

cchiego

You've got two options - spend the energy fighting the pre-existing organization that does good quiz bowl tournaments, or spend the energy helping that organization improve. No one's actually tried to help TACA (at least to the point that I've seen it from here), and in fact most of the complaints ...

cchiego

Fred seems to be suggesting, as have others, that Rohan is a misguided fellow who doesn't really know what he's doing. In talking with others last night (several who have posted in this thread), they argue that he is being sabotaged by his team and is actually a good influence for quizbowl at Vande...

cchiego

I remember the good ol' days when Vanderbilt hosted a series of tournaments titled rather humbly "Academic Bowl Competition" (or ABC) that drew teams from around the country. Those tournaments were the premier quizbowl events in the Southeast and were taken seriously by all involved. Now w...

cchiego

http://www.socalquizbowl.org/guide/

This is the most detailed tournament direction guide in quizbowl. Read it, follow it, profit.

cchiego

For many West Virginians, disease and pollution are simply the price to be paid for economic security. That's the saddest line in the whole story. I'm always astounded how so many otherwise intelligent people seem unable to realize that regulations are not all either GOOD or BAD but different thing...

cchiego

it is mostly because there is a false belief that they take more time Actually, the questions themselves are usually irrelevant because all matches no matter what questions are being used take far too long. Readers at some of the local tournaments that I saw went off on tangents in the middle of th...

cchiego

So I'm curious, who is actually hosting tournaments in East Tennessee, how many are there in a given year, and how many teams would you say are "active" in attending them? Are they good quizbowl (in particular, what sets are they being run on)? All areas of TN other than Nashville are in ...

cchiego

I think that part of the reason that quizbowl has not moved more in this direction has been at times a desire among certain people to have greater control over qb matters, particularly on these forums. But I think that as long as the group pages / twitter accounts / etc. are maintained and overseen...

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