The Quizbowl Resource Center

Oh, that seems tough to not do.

Has anyone in Kentucky thought about mirroring the Collaborative Middle School Tournament? I think it would be really interesting to see how KY middle schools do at good quizbowl.

soaringeagle22 wrote:Has anyone in Kentucky thought about mirroring the Collaborative Middle School Tournament? I think it would be really interesting to see how KY middle schools do at good quizbowl.

Danville's considering it among other possible spring tournament options. If we did it (or something else) we'd do it toward the end of March. Between Governor's Cup State and NAQT State.

soaringeagle22 wrote:Has anyone in Kentucky thought about mirroring the Collaborative Middle School Tournament? I think it would be really interesting to see how KY middle schools do at good quizbowl.

It would certainly be an eye-opener for a lot of Kentucky middle school teams. When I was at LTMS I actually thought that crunching numbers was a legitimate part of high school quizbowl.

Does anyone know any information about the T-party tournament at Centre?

Congratulations to Johnson Central for their victory in this year's Fleming County Academic Tournament. They defeated Pikeville in the tournament finals. More details in the FCAT thread.

grayson77 wrote:Does anyone know any information about the T-party tournament at Centre?

I know plenty about it!

Crazy Andy Watkins wrote:

grayson77 wrote:Does anyone know any information about the T-party tournament at Centre?

I know plenty about it!

Haha; can you tell me what Grayson needs to do about sending a team? (If you know.) Thanks.

Tell Joe Wells you're coming. Write a packet if one of you has played a collegiate tournament before two years ago. Pay him money. Fin.

District competition is scheduled for this week. Naturally, that means there has to be snow in the forecast...

soaringeagle22 wrote:District competition is scheduled for this week. Naturally, that means there has to be snow in the forecast...

I actually can't remember a time when district was on schedual.
So is anyone else ready to see if the questions are more pyramidal this year?

grayson77 wrote: So is anyone else ready to see if the questions are more pyramidal this year?

I've heard from teammates that the practice questions were in the same style as last year's questions. Hopefully I just misheard.

That is very disappointing to hear.
What happened to progress over the next few years?

Well, at least quizbowl is growing in the state every year.

The writing guidelines KAAC has posted on their website ask for questions that most people would recognize as improved or possibly even good. If the GovCup questions follow the ideas they've lined out (multiple clues in descending order of difficulty, etc.) then they should be better questions.

District should be fun, but won't be as pyramidal as we would like I'm sure. Also, would anybody happen to know who changed my picture to an angry bearded lego man? I know it's been like that forever, but that's not what I put for my picture, lol.

Any districts actually get to play today? When are most people planning to make things up, our district (38th) will go on Monday.

FCPanther wrote:Any districts actually get to play today? When are most people planning to make things up, our district (38th) will go on Monday.

As far as I know, the 12th District (Grayson, Edmonson, Ohio, and McLean) is planning to make up the Written part on Tuesday and the Quick Recall on Thursday.

Most of the Kenton County districts played.
I think that was about it, though.

Our district plans on doing everything tomorrow.

So, we just won our district, and I have to say the questions surprised me.
They were not great, but definitely a large improvement.
To be honest, they seemed along the lines of NAQT-A (which I know isn't all that great.)
I'm glad to see that KAAC is finally taking a little action with their words.

Please don't lay in on me quizbowl purists.
I realize that NSC, HSAQP, etc. are still very superior.
I just think it's nice to see some improvement.

Well, last night I moderated 3 rounds and watched a 4th at the 12th District tournament, so I figure I'll give some observations on the question:

1) Definitely improved. They're not perfect yet, but I applaud KAAC for another step in the right direction.

2) With that being said, there was a lot of variance between questions. I know this is somewhat natural considering that there are a lot of different writers for Governor's Cup, but there was definitely a range where some questions were very good while others were not good. I see that the writers (in accordance with KAAC guidelines) are generally writing pyramidal questions, although some aren't fully adjusted yet. PACE has worked with writers in Kentucky I think, and I'm sure that members of the quizbowl community outside of KY have contributed some questions as well; and I believe that is part of the improvement.

3) I didn't notice any absolutely abhorrent questions, which is nice to see.

4) KAAC has moved away from Pop Culture pretty much altogether. I don't particuarly remember Governor's Cup being heavy in "Trash" anyway, but even that amount has been reduced this year.

5) Math Computation questions still exist, although there was a decent amount of math history and theory in the set too.

6) This is probably the most important thing of the post: KAAC needs to separate the tossups and bonuses. There is nothing more annoying than reading a 5-6 line question to a team simply because that's the next number in the packet.

7) Having 50 question halves (thus, 100 question games) is a horrible idea when you're using pyramidal questions. Not once did I (or any other reader there) manage to get through the entire 50 questions within the 15 minute time limit. KAAC could easily get away with separating the tossups and bonuses while having 20 tossup /bounus halves. While there'll only be 20-40 questions in a half, that's OK whenever you're using longer questions. Ideally, KAAC will adopt a format similar to ACF or NAQT; but if that doesn't happen there still needs to be reform.

Gerd Bockmann wrote:

4) KAAC has moved away from Pop Culture pretty much altogether. I don't particuarly remember Governor's Cup being heavy in "Trash" anyway, but even that amount has been reduced this year.

6) This is probably the most important thing of the post: KAAC needs to separate the tossups and bonuses. There is nothing more annoying than reading a 5-6 line question to a team simply because that's the next number in the packet.

4.) I remember in the final round of the State Finals last year there was a question about Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle. Even thought it was a really retarded question, especially for the final round, it's nice to see that the question writers have a good sense of humor.

6.) I agree. This goes along with what you said about the time limit. Reading a long, hearty question wastes soo much time, especially when a team hears all of the clues. In my personal opinion, they need to separate the Toss-Ups and Bonuses, increase the time limit, and/or decrease the amount of questions.

Also, testing-wise, the scores on the WA's at Districts weren't very high this year, especially the Science test, which I thought was deceptively easy.

Looks like KAAC isn't going to send a team to the HSAPQ All Star tournament. Therefore, we (the students/coaches) can make a team ourselves and send in a bid as Team Kentucky, but we'll have to act fast as the deadline is March 17th. Any ideas?

dbarman wrote:Looks like KAAC isn't going to send a team to the HSAPQ All Star tournament. Therefore, we (the students/coaches) can make a team ourselves and send in a bid as Team Kentucky, but we'll have to act fast as the deadline is March 17th. Any ideas?

I know I'm not really good enough to be on the team this year, but it would be fun to go as either an alternate or just a spectator.
As for who is good enough, I think some Dunbar and Manual people should look into convincing Luke from Adair to be on the team.

Well, the detailed plan I suggested a couple months ago wouldn't work on short notice, but I do think the state can get together a team. Of course, it will have to be a group of players who get together and submit the bid themselves.

Most likely it will be consortium of players from Manual and Dunbar, and they can figure that out between themselves. The other players that I think should be looked into are Luke Maupin from Adair County and Aaron Kinney of Madisonville North Hopkins. After that, I know a lot of other good players who do well on pyramidal questions, but probably not to the ability of the players from Dunbar and Manual.

Should we hold a sort of tryout? or should we have people vote?

Tryout would probably be the ideal way to do it, but with limited time and everyone's busy schedule, it might be hard to have all the top pyramidal players in the state be there.

Voting is also problematic in that we have to decide who should get to vote. Unfortunately, most (i'd say 90-95%) of the coaches and players in Kentucky participate in few, if any, pyramidal tournaments and even fewer have been to tournaments at HSAPQ All-star level, which I'm assuming would be similar in difficulty with PACE National or maybe even ACF Fall. The only KY teams that I know have participated in college level tournaments are Dunbar, Manuel, and Grayson, but I'm hoping players from other teams would also express interest.

Centre would be interested in hosting a tryout tournament for team Kentucky, and then appoint a coach by voting, probably.

powerplant wrote:Centre would be interested in hosting a tryout tournament for team Kentucky, and then appoint a coach by voting, probably.

I'd be willing to help with this in any way (moderating, etc.) you all need me to.

powerplant wrote:Centre would be interested in hosting a tryout tournament for team Kentucky, and then appoint a coach by voting, probably.

Great! Assuming tryouts do happen somewhere, how should we do it? Should we try to have a team of specialists? (That’s kind of the way Dunbar lines up our teams except most of us are pretty crappy at our specialties but knows a few things in other people’s areas) Or should we have a team of the 4 best players regardless of specialties?

I'd say that you'll need a team of specialists, with one each in the big 3 subjects.

dbarman wrote:HSAPQ All-star level, which I'm assuming would be similar in difficulty with PACE National or maybe even ACF Fall.

I've been told its difficulty will be either like PACE NSC or ACF Regionals, correct me if I'm wrong.

dbarman wrote:

powerplant wrote:Centre would be interested in hosting a tryout tournament for team Kentucky, and then appoint a coach by voting, probably.

Great! Assuming tryouts do happen somewhere, how should we do it? Should we try to have a team of specialists? (That’s kind of the way Dunbar lines up our teams except most of us are pretty crappy at our specialties but knows a few things in other people’s areas) Or should we have a team of the 4 best players regardless of specialties?

Yeah, I like this idea too. I would go with whatever 4 players can cover most of the canon collectively. Like, I'm guessing few Kentucky literature specialists can meaningfully contribute when they're on the same team as Jack or Victor.

dbarman wrote:

powerplant wrote:Centre would be interested in hosting a tryout tournament for team Kentucky, and then appoint a coach by voting, probably.

Great! Assuming tryouts do happen somewhere, how should we do it? Should we try to have a team of specialists? (That’s kind of the way Dunbar lines up our teams except most of us are pretty crappy at our specialties but knows a few things in other people’s areas) Or should we have a team of the 4 best players regardless of specialties?

I would most likely steal the format that Ohio State used in their tryouts for Team Ohio. We would have people play on randomized teams, and track who scored points in what categories, as well as have a ballot system to allow players to say who they would prefer to play with (as well as people that they would hope to not play with).

There's an issue with time as well. I believe the bids are due in by March 17th, which means there is limited time to work with. These are the weekends between now and then:

2/20: Governor's Cup Regionals
2/27:
3/6: Dunbar Tournament
3/13: State is that weekend

The 27th seems like it would be the best weekend it seems. Are there any HS event that weekend that I don't know of?

Gerd Bockmann wrote: The 27th seems like it would be the best weekend it seems. Are there any HS event that weekend that I don't know of?

Science Fair

Dunbar's March 6th tournament is HSAPQ. I'm sure we could arrange for Joe, or whoever organizes this, to use PLD's building for tryouts-maybe on the night before. I think Johnson Co. may be coming and they have some players who should consider this. I'm not sure what other KY teams are coming, yet. Lexington is a pretty central location for the state and I'd be glad to host practices even if there are no PLD players on the team. Kentucky has a lot of good quiz bowl players- we should certainly send a team!!!

SHM wrote:Dunbar's March 6th tournament is HSAPQ. I'm sure we could arrange for Joe, or whoever organizes this, to use PLD's building for tryouts-maybe on the night before. I think Johnson Co. may be coming and they have some players who should consider this. I'm not sure what other KY teams are coming, yet. Lexington is a pretty central location for the state and I'd be glad to host practices even if there are no PLD players on the team. Kentucky has a lot of good quiz bowl players- we should certainly send a team!!!

Running it then or the Saturday of State seem like good options.

And speaking of Dunbar's tournament, could you e-mail out a registration form or something similar Susan?

I'm not sure about doing it on the night before the Dunbar tournament.
This would be kind of inconvenient for us and Manual (maybe), because we don't really need to stay overnight for a tournament that is two hours away.

The Saturday of state sounds like a good idea.
Hopefully it could be later on in the day because of Governor's School for the Arts and FPS.

Huang wrote:

dbarman wrote:HSAPQ All-star level, which I'm assuming would be similar in difficulty with PACE National or maybe even ACF Fall.

I've been told its difficulty will be either like PACE NSC or ACF Regionals, correct me if I'm wrong.

According to Ted Gioia’s announcement of the tournament, the set will be harder than either nationals.

If Saturday before state becomes the consensus (as most of the potential players should be there), I like Joe’s idea of copping the Ohio selection process. Joe, not to put you on the spot or anything, would you be available then to run the tryout? I feel like you have some of the most experience with national level quizbowl, are unbiased, and can evidently put together the logistics of a tournament despite set-backs like slow readers.

I think the Saturday of State would be best, too. That way, you would most likely have all of the state's interested players in the same spot.
I would NOT do it during the times of FPS and Comp, in case any players are in those events.

Does holding tryouts at Dunbar on March 6th right after the tournament not work? March 13th coincides with fun stuff like a state chess tournament and the SAT.
Edit: By the way, I'm assuming Joe will be using HSAPQ's NASAT tryout set?

Personally I support the idea of running this around the time of State, simply because I'm hoping to get Centre to go to the Illinois MUT mirror on the weekend of the 6th.

Since Dunbar is using HSAPQ sets, would the tournament be a good way of, kind of, surveying potential prospects for the All-Star team?

Faiyad wrote:Since Dunbar is using HSAPQ sets, would the tournament be a good way of, kind of, surveying potential prospects for the All-Star team?

It would be good for getting an idea of what the team may consist of, but the individual results may be skewed because some teams (Manual, Johnson Central) have several good starters on their team.
Other teams (Adair and Madisonville) have one player that is much stronger than their other starters.
This would result in the players from weaker teams having higher PPG values.
That is why an alternate format should be used.

I'm personally against having the tryout on the 6th because I'll probably be in Louisville for an interview.

grayson77 wrote:

Faiyad wrote:Since Dunbar is using HSAPQ sets, would the tournament be a good way of, kind of, surveying potential prospects for the All-Star team?

It would be good for getting an idea of what the team may consist of, but the individual results may be skewed because some teams (Manual, Johnson Central) have several good starters on their team.
Other teams (Adair and Madisonville) have one player that is much stronger than their other starters.
This would result in the players from weaker teams having higher PPG values.
That is why an alternate format should be used.

What I am saying is that it would be a good way of seeing what players seem strong.
Also, from what I believe, Dunbar kept individual statistics are their Fall Tournament, so I believe it is safe to assume that they will keep statistics at the Spring tournament as well.

dbarman wrote:I'm personally against having the tryout on the 6th because I'll probably be in Louisville for an interview.

Like I said in my above post, I don't think that we should have the tryouts then, I think it would be a good way to just see who has good potential.

The idea for the Saturday of State seems to be the best/most popular.

Faiyad wrote:

grayson77 wrote:

Faiyad wrote:Since Dunbar is using HSAPQ sets, would the tournament be a good way of, kind of, surveying potential prospects for the All-Star team?

It would be good for getting an idea of what the team may consist of, but the individual results may be skewed because some teams (Manual, Johnson Central) have several good starters on their team.
Other teams (Adair and Madisonville) have one player that is much stronger than their other starters.
This would result in the players from weaker teams having higher PPG values.
That is why an alternate format should be used.

What I am saying is that it would be a good way of seeing what players seem strong.
Also, from what I believe, Dunbar kept individual statistics are their Fall Tournament, so I believe it is safe to assume that they will keep statistics at the Spring tournament as well.

We'll try, but don’t count on it. The main stats dudes are Brian and me, and I’ll probably be gone. But you are right, it should be a good way to see who’s strong though the actual All-Star tournament will be a lot more difficult, closer to college level than regular HSAPQ, I’d imagine. HSAPQ has relatively easy questions as compared to most house-written tournaments, and this tournament is supposed to be harder than PACE NSC.

So are there any plans for other tournaments (than Dunbar and U of L) this spring?

I think those are the only ones that are scheduled for right now.

dbarman wrote:

Faiyad wrote:

grayson77 wrote:

Faiyad wrote:Since Dunbar is using HSAPQ sets, would the tournament be a good way of, kind of, surveying potential prospects for the All-Star team?

It would be good for getting an idea of what the team may consist of, but the individual results may be skewed because some teams (Manual, Johnson Central) have several good starters on their team.
Other teams (Adair and Madisonville) have one player that is much stronger than their other starters.
This would result in the players from weaker teams having higher PPG values.
That is why an alternate format should be used.

What I am saying is that it would be a good way of seeing what players seem strong.
Also, from what I believe, Dunbar kept individual statistics are their Fall Tournament, so I believe it is safe to assume that they will keep statistics at the Spring tournament as well.

We'll try, but don’t count on it. The main stats dudes are Brian and me, and I’ll probably be gone. But you are right, it should be a good way to see who’s strong though the actual All-Star tournament will be a lot more difficult, closer to college level than regular HSAPQ, I’d imagine. HSAPQ has relatively easy questions as compared to most house-written tournaments, and this tournament is supposed to be harder than PACE NSC.

Like Ping said, the set we're using will be immensely easier than the NASAT set so, if I were Joe, I wouldn't even give any weight to anyone's performance on it. Person A who scores 100 PPG on the set we're using could very likely score only 10 PPG on the NASAT set.