A Call To Action!

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David Riley
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A Call To Action!

Post by David Riley »

This weekend, our season begins in earnest with Northwestern’s Wake-Up Call. New this year are the SCOP novice tournaments, featured at various locations throughout the state on October 30. Tournaments such as the Harvard Mirror and New Trier’s newly-named ADVANTAGE will again be held. It is also likely that some of us will once again host pre-Nationals tournaments in April and May. For the last several years, Illinois has had record numbers at nationals, and while we’re not State College, our teams have performed well. Then, Illinois placed third at the first National Academic All-Star Tournament last year, thanks to Ben Carbery, Andrew Deveau, Kevin Malis, and Lloyd Sy, and last week, Kevin Malis and Nolan Winkler proved that they could hold their own at the Early Fall Tournament at U of I.

Why this stroll down memory lane and preview of coming attractions? Because Illinois should continue their climb de profundis and be better than ever before. Stevenson and Auburn will no doubt continue their domination, and good things can also be expected from Carbondale, Lisle, Loyola, OPRF and St. Ignatius, to name a few. Keep an eye out for Champaign Centennial and Chatham Glenwood, who will no doubt continue to improve.

Attend as many quiz bowl tournaments as you can. A list of these is at http://www.ihssbca.org. If expenses permit, attend college level tournaments. These are always eye-openers and will give you an idea of where you place. Study questions from quizbowlpackets.com, where some of the best questions are archived.

Don't rest on your laurels!
David Riley
Coach Emeritus, Loyola Academy, Wilmette, Illinois, 1993-2010
Steering Committee, IHSSBCA, 1996 -
Member, PACE, 2012 -

"This is 1183, of course we're barbarians" -- Eleanor of Aquitaine in "The Lion in Winter"
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Dominator
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by Dominator »

I'd like to make a seemingly unrelated post, but trust me on this.

Can people please provide me some examples of bad questions from Masonic last year (or point me to the set, if it exists somewhere)? I'm not talking hoses or antipyramidality, but things so bad a layperson could see them. Some examples I have:
(1) In Sectionals, we had a bonus asking us to identify the brightest star in Cygnus as Deneb, then later asked which constellation has Deneb as its brightest star.
(2) At State, there was a Calculus bonus (that made my head spin, as Auburn can confirm) on integration whose answers had made use of the (nonexistent) anti-Chain Rule.

Any more would be greatly appreciated.

(BTW, I read the archived Masonic Aftermath thread, but there were not many specific questions [although the answer lines on "fine arts" were helpful])
Dr. Noah Prince

Normal Community High School (2002)
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2004, 2007, 2008)

Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy - Scholastic Bowl coach (2009-2014), assistant coach (2014-2015), well wisher (2015-2016)
guy in San Diego (2016-present)
President of Qblitz (2018-present)

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dtaylor4
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by dtaylor4 »

Dominator wrote:I'd like to make a seemingly unrelated post, but trust me on this.

Can people please provide me some examples of bad questions from Masonic last year (or point me to the set, if it exists somewhere)? I'm not talking hoses or antipyramidality, but things so bad a layperson could see them. Some examples I have:
(1) In Sectionals, we had a bonus asking us to identify the brightest star in Cygnus as Deneb, then later asked which constellation has Deneb as its brightest star.
(2) At State, there was a Calculus bonus (that made my head spin, as Auburn can confirm) on integration whose answers had made use of the (nonexistent) anti-Chain Rule.

Any more would be greatly appreciated.

(BTW, I read the archived Masonic Aftermath thread, but there were not many specific questions [although the answer lines on "fine arts" were helpful])
You'll probably have to pay QG dirty money for the set.
jonah
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by jonah »

It would be inappropriate for me to email you the set, which is why I totally didn't just do that.
Jonah Greenthal
National Academic Quiz Tournaments
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Dominator
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by Dominator »

jonah wrote:It would be inappropriate for me to email you the set, which is why I totally didn't just do that.
You're right, it would have been very inappropriate. Glad to see you finally developing a sense of decorum.
Dr. Noah Prince

Normal Community High School (2002)
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2004, 2007, 2008)

Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy - Scholastic Bowl coach (2009-2014), assistant coach (2014-2015), well wisher (2015-2016)
guy in San Diego (2016-present)
President of Qblitz (2018-present)

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Stained Diviner
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by Stained Diviner »

You are now in possession of a letter I wrote to Dale Thayer after the tournament which specifies flaws in 77 of the tossups that were used at Masonic Regionals last year.
David Reinstein
Head Writer and Editor for Scobol Solo, Masonics, and IESA; TD for Scobol Solo and Reinstein Varsity; IHSSBCA Board Member; IHSSBCA Chair (2004-2014); PACE President (2016-2018)
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abnormal abdomen
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by abnormal abdomen »

I'm intrigued. Dr. Prince, where are you going with this?
Abid Haseeb
Auburn High School '12
Brown University '16
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CometCoach72
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by CometCoach72 »

David Riley wrote:Attend as many quiz bowl tournaments as you can.
I just finsished moving, the masters' degree program is in the rear-view mirror, and suddenly I have a lot more time on my hands than in years past. I'm Board of Education approval away from two long-distance trips for tournaments. Let's do this thing.
Jay Winter
Greenville HS (IL) Scholastic Bowl Coach and Chief UN Translator for Math
Decatur MacArthur Class of 1990 - Illinois State Class of 1994 - MS Ed SIU Edwardsville 2010
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David Riley
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Re: A Call To Action!

Post by David Riley »

Great! I'll add you to the list!
David Riley
Coach Emeritus, Loyola Academy, Wilmette, Illinois, 1993-2010
Steering Committee, IHSSBCA, 1996 -
Member, PACE, 2012 -

"This is 1183, of course we're barbarians" -- Eleanor of Aquitaine in "The Lion in Winter"
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