What's the matter with Kansas?

[Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)]

Yeah, if you have 10 players, I would say it's TOTALLY possible to organize a small K-State tournament by December or January. If you buy an NAQT A-set you wouldn't have to worry about the difficulty being out of hand, and you could easily run a 9 game (10 team) round robin with that set, which I think would be plenty for Kansas teams. Then if that goes well, you could easily work to expanding the schedule next year - if you could ultimately run tournaments at the beginning and end of the season that hit 18 teams, I bet that would be a huge help for Kansas's quizbowl future.

In Missouri, we were fighting a state organization that was highly entrenched, operated a lot like KSHSAA, and had basically 0 teams who were actively pro-pyramidal quizbowl. The only thing that changed that was years of the only people in Missouri who knew better - people on the college teams - going out of their way to organize tournaments and expose more and more teams to good questions, and then the more we did that, the more teams started to decide to play good quizbowl and improve exponentially, and host their own things. It didn't happen overnight, but once there were a nice sized cluster of good tournaments, things took off. There's no reason Kansas couldn't produce a similarly robust circuit - there are obviously good schools there and LOTS of teams that exist. The missing component is simply the teams that exist stepping up to host stuff. So given how many community colleges are out there along with your team, the hosts are there. Heck, you even have one team already, Wichita East, that seems pretty cool and would be in your corner! Speaking as somebody who was in your position, I beg you, PLEASE try to talk to some people and see how possible it would be to get a K-State tournament or two, and some community colleges to host good stuff.

[AKKOLADE]

Can you hold events in Kansas without, like, causing teams' to be obliterated by the state organization? It's been awhile since I read the rules for there (see avatar for reaction to said rules).

[Stained Diviner]

Kansas teams are limited to eight competitions for the year, and all of those competitions must be mid-October to mid-February. Email me if you want contact info for somebody (David Shelly) who knows more than I do about the limitations.

[Sima Guang Hater]

I wanted to necro this thread to simply express my happiness at K-state showing up to things and am hoping that they will eventually host high school tournaments. There were several tournaments of a non-standard format that my high school team (Washburn Rural) attended, so hopefully any such tournament will simply be another one of those and the fever will catch on.

[srdshelly]

I imagine there's nobody reading the thread anymore, but I could offer a few comments. The rules and regulations of state association are absolutely stifling as others have suggested. Trying to do anything creative, new, or different results in smashing into a brick wall. I would love to see K-State or someone host an NAQT-style tournament. I think there would be decent response. A major issue is that every player is limited to 8 tournaments, and they must fall between essentially the third Monday of October and the beginning of February. The only exception is a tournament limited to a single category (despite the Handbook which clearly says a "Scholars' Bowl" tournament consists of THREE categories). The problem with getting any change is that it must go through the whole activities association bureaucracy - local principals and ADs, a council, and an executive committee, each of which has some combination of fiscal, inertia, turf and apathy reasons to block it. The state association executive in charge of Scholars' Bowl is simply not interested in seeing changes - he likes the system exactly as it is - though the coaches' association has made several proposals over the years. I've taken teams out of state to NAQT and other events, and am definitely hoping to do so again, but remember that these too count against that miserable total of 8, so it's not possible to do that very often and still participate in our circuit. While the North Korea reference may be stretching the point just a bit, the fact is we really are very tightly restricted. To be honest, I know there are other coaches who feel like I do, but there are probably also plenty who are quite happy to run their programs as they are and would feel threatened by significant change.

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[srdshelly]

Yes you could hold events in Kansas. They would have to be in-season and would count against the eight-tournament limit, but there would be programs willing to play in them. Wichita State used to have a pretty sizable high school tossup-bonus tournament while their team was active. People from Oklahoma University would come up and help, and the WSU people would return the favor for OU's high school tournament. I recall years when 40-60 teams would participate at WSU, including up to seven from our school.

Note that I am about as anti-KSHSAA as can be when it comes to their regulations and restrictions. The one good side is that there are indeed many, many participating schools. Just about every tiny school in every small town has a program. I have a friend who teaches and coaches at one such school and about a third of the student body participates. That's good. Such a school would not likely have any pretensions of competing outside its part of Kansas though. What I can't understand is why the state organization can't run its existing program without also allowing those who do have broader horizons to participate on terms similar to what can be done in other states.

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[Sima Guang Hater]

Wow, Wichita East! We beat you guys in the 6A state finals in 2005. I don't know if you're the same coach from that era, but nonetheless its great to see you on the boards.

I seem to remember you having a fairly large team; would it be possible to host an HSAPQ tournament at Wichita East? You're known for your strong program, and I think if you started this as a trend more schools would get behind pyramidal questions.

I remember a group of people on this board actually tried emailing David Cherry (the head of KSHSAA quiz bowl) and he sent a pretty condescending note back; is he elected to his position, or appointed? It seems like the first best step would be to get someone interested in better QB into KSHSAA.

[Stained Diviner]

It seems like the first best step would be to get someone interested in better QB into KSHSAA.

Don't get your hopes up. The first step is to get some good invitational tournaments. If there have been some recently, then somebody needs to build on that.

[srdshelly]

I'm the same coach. We've lost to different schools at State over the years, of course (and won a few times too). 2005 makes you Washburn Rural. Mr. Cherry is hired by the executive board as an administrator for the activities association for a number of sports as well as Scholars' Bowl. We do generally have a large team at East. I think it could be possible we could host something. We already have a tournament of our own we're preparing for, so I'd have to see how things play out as far as this season is concerned. For next season, assuming I'm back, I'd definitely be interested.

[srdshelly]

Anyone willing to hazard a guess at how these questions work?

World Language
Question:
She eats an apple every day with her breakfast.
French:
Elle mange une pomme chaque jour avec son petit déjeuner.
German:
Sie ißt einen Apfel jeden Tag mit ihrem Frühstück.
Spanish:
Ella come una manzana cada dia con su desayuno.

Oh dear Lord. I'd hazard that, 99 times out of 100, a student will give a correct translation that doesn't exactly match the one provided. Reason #503 why foreign language questions are bad. Fortunately the Mid-Suburban League doesn't use a question provider that includes those kinds of questions in the JV sets... oh wait...

I can't agree. I've been on the panel that does the World Language questions for Kansas Regionals and State, and there is a great deal of attention to thinking out possible alternative responses that should be accepted and listing them. While nobody can catch every possible nuance in advance, I'd say that really the opposite is true at the Regionals/State level - disputes happen but are infrequent, and are usually resolved satisfactorily.

[Great Bustard]

I'm running the Western Kansas History Bee and Bowl on Sunday, February 16 at Rolla Jr/Sr. High. They're our National JV Small School Champion from last year, and their Superintendent of Schools has been helping me with outreach. They seem very excited, and hopefully they can find a way to get other pyramidal experience, though given the location, it won't be easy. Our Eastern Kansas tournament will run on Saturday, February 22 at Chanute HS. Both Kansas events are on C Set. Kansas teams can also go to Oklahoma to play a different set (B Set).

[gustavus.adolphus]

Sorry for resurrecting this.

Yeah, I'm a freshman at Collegiate in Wichita, and we're definitely up for attending new and interesting QB tournaments in the area, assuming that it complies with KSHAA rules.

Also, I want to say thanks to NHBB as my first real pyramidal tournament.

[bluesdjben]

K-State is planning to host a NAQT-format high-school tournament in late fall of next year. We will be sending out invitations to high schools in September. We hope to see a bunch of great Kansas high school teams there!

We did put together a tournament this year, but unfortunately we did not get our act together soon enough to avoid being stymied by KSHSAA's rules of "no tournaments outside the Scholars' Bowl season" and "no more than 8 tournaments per season" (I admit, those are both really dumb!) However, aside from those problems, the eminent Mr. Cherry did quickly approve our request, and we were good to go with a tiny field before early February snowstorms halted us in our tracks. Now that we have the experience of organizing a tournament, putting one together next year should be a lot easier, especially if we get started well in advance like we should have this year.

We also held a small college tournament this fall, the first one we've hosted since 2008 if I remember correctly. I will most likely be gone next year (graduated in December), but I'll keep up with what's going on with my friends at K-State even if I'm not around. I think we'd like to host another college tournament next year too, so if we're doing a high school tournament in the fall, it's likely that a college tournament would be in spring.

@Dave Shelly--Glad to hear about your efforts at Wichita East. Keep up the good work! I've enjoyed watching your teams on Quest in recent years.

[srdshelly]

Thanks Ben. Please let us know if your event is held in the fall. I couldn't agree with you more about the "those are both really dumb" comment, but just try to get any meaningful change through. We are blocked at every turn. Best wishes.

[bluesdjben]

Wichita East will definitely be one of the first teams we contact!

[srdshelly]

Any information yet about something at K-State?