Alt.college.college-bowl FAQ
Patrick G. Matthews
Last changed: 12/3/93
Edited by: Patrick Matthews (matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu)
Contributors (in no particular order): Pat Matthews, Jennie Rosenbaum, Mark
Ruzon, Tom Michael, Carole Chang, Peter Freeman, Richard Dunlap, Randy
Buehler, Mike Simon, Sendhil Revuluri, Peter McCorquodale
Comments? Suggestions? Send them to Pat Matthews at
matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu.
List of question subjects:
0. What is College Bowl, and do I have to bring my own ball
1. How to get info about tournaments
2. Differences between College Bowl and ACF
2a. Other formats available
3. Who can play
4. What kind of questions are asked
5. What's the difference between College Bowl and Jeopardy!
6. Is there a College Bowl contact list
7. How did College Bowl start
8. What makes a question "good"
9. How to recruit people and/or start a club
9a. How to run the campus tournament
10. What equipment is needed
11. How schools can acquire questions
11a. How do I write questions
12. What are the regional breakdowns
12a. Who won the CB RCT's in 92-93
13. Past national champions
13a. How does a school get to the Nationals
14. Which schools normally host tournaments and when are they
List of abbreviations:
CB College Bowl, the game
CBI College Bowl Inc.
ACUI Association of College Unions Int'l--partners with CBI
ACF Academic Competition Foundation--alternate quiz bowl format
RCT Regional Championship Tournament
NCT National Championship Tournament
HCASC Honda Campus All Star Challenge
HSB High School Bowl
J! Jeopardy!, the TV quiz show
***************************************************************************
(0) What is College Bowl, and do I have to bring my own ball?
CB is a game in which two teams face off, earning points by answering
questions covering every conceivable category of human knowledge.
There are two types of questions, tossups and bonuses (boni). Tossups must
be answered individually, i.e. without the aid of a teammate. The first
person to "ring in" attempts to answer the question.
If a player correctly answers a tossup, his/her team earns a bonus
question. The entire team is allowed to work together to answer bonus
questions.
CB is dubbed "The Varsity Sport of the Mind," so the only reason to bring
a ball is to toss it around with teammates in between matches.
****************************************************************
(1) How do I get information about tournaments (school or ACUI)?
Campus tournaments at your school are generally held by your school's
Student Activities office or by your school's College Bowl
club/program/whatever. These tournaments are typically intramural in
nature, but each school may have its own participation rules. The best way to
find out the dates and locations of your school's campus tournament is to call
your student activities office and ask who the contact is for College Bowl. If
you cannot find your school's contact that way, call CBI at 1-800-234-BOWL
(or 818-788-4103 if you're in the area). If your school has an official
contact, they will be able to tell you who this person is, and will more
than likely have an office number and phone number.
In addition, many schools (to name but a FEW Princeton, Vanderbilt,
Stanford, etc.) host intercollegiate tournaments, in which many
schools send teams to compete. Invitations are usually snail-mailed to a
school's College Bowl coordinator. Nowadays, more tournaments are
announced via email and (hopefully) this newsgroup. Normally, to
participate in an invitational, a school must pay a fee and submit a
packet of questions for each team it enters. In addition, at invitational
tournaments, rules of play are often modified versions rather than strict
versions of CB or ACF rules.
***********************************************************************
(2) What is the difference between CB and ACF?
CB is an academic quiz game created by Don Reid which pits two teams of four
players each against each other. The game is now administered by CBI in
partnership with ACUI.
ACF is a similar game created a couple of years ago by a few schools,
mostly in the Southeast. This group created the ACF format becuase they
were dissatisfied with the CB format and with CBI. The ACF proponents have
attempted to create a more academically rigorous format, a reaction to
what they claim to be softness in official CBI questions.
There are numerous and vociferous adherents to each camp, and a great many
people are comfortable with both formats. Rather than seeing each format
in an adversarial light, these people look at the difference in formats as
an opportunity to sample two different but not mutually exclusive formats.
While the RCT's for CB and ACF strictly follow their own formats, most
invitationals combine elements of both formats.
The rules for CB and ACF have some similarities. Both are based on individual
games involving two teams of four players each. There are two types of
questions: toss-ups and bonuses. A toss-up question is read first. If a
player signals and answers the toss-up correctly, the player's team receives
10 points, and is read a bonus question which only that team has a chance to
answer. If the player answers the toss-up incorrectly, a player from the
opposing team may signal and answer. A five point penalty is assessed the
team if the player signals to interrupt the toss-up while the question is
being read, and gives a wrong answer; otherwise there is no penalty for
guessing. Players work individually on toss-ups, but work together as a team
to answer the bonus questions. Toss-up questions require single answers and
are worth 10 points each; bonus questions may require single or multiple
answers, and have a maximum value of 30 points.
A COMPARISON OF COLLEGE BOWL AND THE ACF (Peter Freeman)
CB ACF
Time: 7 minutes halves 20 questions, untimed
(8 minutes in HCASC)
Recognition: Wait until called, Varies by tournament.
either by name or
number.
Grads: Official team may no limit on grad participation
only have one (will be
reviewed for 94-95
season)
Eligibility: 6 years of RCT or unlimited
NCT play
How to get to Win your regional Finish in the top three at one
Nationals: (geographic repre- of the ACF Regionals; or host
(see question 13a) sentation) a tourney with 8 schools or
more; or request a wild-card
(good schools with bad travel
funds); or host the ACF region-
al; or win an ACF-registered
tournament (registration done
by contacting the ACF ahead
of time)...
(non-geographic representation)
How may teams may One per school As many as you can qualify
go to the RCT and/or
NCT?:
Intramural Tourney: Required Not required
(all team members
must play at least
one game)
Question buying: At least 10 packets Not required
at a full cost of
$60 a piece to be
allowed into regionals
(these packets are
used for the intra-
mural). Early order
and quantity order
discounts can bring
price down to $48 @.
Types of questions: Speed-oriented pop Deeper, more rigorous. Little
fluff, some gems hidden current events or pop culture.
inside, more "everyday
experience" questions,
whatever that means.
Mix of categories tends Almost no consistency in
to be very consistent category breakdowns per
in CBI packets, less so packet.
at invitationals.
Relies on a few Relies on submissions from
"professional question (hopefully) talented
writers" amateurs
Faults: Vague lead-in followed Questions can be too long.
by concrete clue, which A typical CB player from Joe
means many questions Schmo St. would think they are
are a survival of the too hard.
quickest.
Lax editing means uneven
questions.
Can be insipidly easy.
We pay their salaries. Nationals is like any other
Graduate students may invitational, no Radio, TV,
participate, but one or awards banquets.
per team rule limits
their involvement. Lack of eligibility limit
may allow "dinosaurs" to
continue playing for years.
The program is still in its
growing stages, hence it does
not yet have a strong, nation-
wide network.
Advantages: Been around since 1953, Allows grads a competitive
it's the leader. forum.
Puts on a good show LOW COST.
for Nationals.
Few protests because of the
clearer nature of the
questions IF QUESTIONS HAVE
BEEN EDITED WELL!
ACUI partnership gives ACF was founded by and is
it the support of many run by many well-established
student union adminis- school programs and players
trators nationwide
Quote from the other "Too much fluff!" "Too hard!"
side: "Face it, State U. "None of that timed-match
would wipe Tech excitment!"
out...so why can't
they play at Nationals?"
Average score: 250-220 150-100
Top three finishers Virginia (qualified Chicago A (won ACF NCT)
in 1992-93: for but did not play
ACF NCT)
Michigan (did not Maryland A (did not play CB)
play ACF)
Chicago Harvard A (4th in CB NCT)
As far as information about how to sign up with the ACF goes, you can contact
Peter Freeman at pet...@oddjob.uchicago.edu.
Schools are encouraged to participate in both formats.
*******************************************************************
(2a) What other quiz bowl formats are available?
HONDA CAMPUS ALL STAR CHALLENGE (Tom Michael)
Honda Campus All Star Challenge (HCASC) is a version of ACUI College
Bowl for historically black colleges and universities (HBCU). 64 teams are
invited each year to one of four sectional tournaments held in March.
Nearly all the teams competing are from the Southeast. Four schools from
each sectional advance to a National Championship Tournament held in May.
After a preliminary round robin, the top eight teams qualify for a single
elimination final tournament. This tournament is videotaped, and broadcast
on the cable network Black Entertainment Television (BET) at 1:00 p.m.
Eastern Time during the months of June and July. American Honda sponsors
the broadcast, and provides over $300,000 in grants to the participating
schools. Each school participating receives some scholarship funds, with the
winning school taking home $50,000 in scholarship money.
HCASC uses the standard College Bowl rules, except that each half is eight
rather than seven minutes long. Although generally balanced, the questions
place a heavy emphasis on African-American culture and history. The
televised portions feature several audio-visual questions each game.
Since many questions used in the ACUI RCT and NCT are re-used for the
HCASC tournament, HBCUs are prohibited from playing in ACUI competition.
Because of this policy, few (if any) HBCUs have participated in
invitationals or the ACF RCT or NCT.
Three years old as of the Summer of 1993, HCASC is currently the only form
of College Bowl televised nationally. Also run by CBI, for more information on
HCASC, please call CBI at 1-800-234-BOWL (or 818-788-4103). The past HCASC
champs are listed in the answer to question 13.
HIGH SCHOOL BOWL
CBI also runs High School Bowl. HSB is identical in format to CB, except
that questions tend to be a bit easier. For more information on HSB, call
CBI's toll-free number.
It must be stated here that many colleges conduct quiz tournaments for
high school players, and that there are about a bazillion high school
formats, many of which are similar to CB, but only HSB has official ties
to CBI.
*******************************************************************
(3) Do you have to be an undergrad to play, or are grad students /
staff / unaffiliated people OK?
That depends. Many schools do not restrict graduate student
participation for their campus tournament, but some do. The same goes for
staff members. Most schools do not allow non-students to play in their campus
tournaments. However, participation in intercollegiate invitationals
is entirely at the discretion of the host school. CBI only allows one
graduate student on the team that each school sends to the RCT and NCT,
while ACF does not restrict graduate students at all. As stated before,
the final say on who gets to play goes to the host school for *any*
tournament except CB RCT and NCT.
Some schools host "masters" tournaments that are open to *everyone*. These
tournaments are usually conducted in the summer.
***********************************************************************
(4) What kind of questions are asked?
Questions span the entire range of human knowledge. A typical round should
have questions on history, literature, the arts, social science, "hard"
science and/or mathematics, mythology/philosophy/religion, problem solving,
current events/politics, sports, and pop culture (some categories may
have been left out unintentionally).
Question content varies slightly between CB and ACF. CB questions tend to
be structured so that most of the players should know the answers to
tossups read in their entirety, while ACF questions tend to be more obscure in
nature. For an example, a CB tossup might read, "This US President had the
longest Inauguration Address, but caught pneumonia during the ceremony and
died a few weeks later. For ten points, name him." (A: Wm. Henry Harrison)
An ACF tossup on the same subject would read: "George Badger was his
Secretary of the Navy, Thomas Ewing was his Treasury Secretary, and Francis
Granger was his Postmaster General; but it was Secretary of State Daniel
Webster who persuaded this President to leave many references to Imperial
Rome out of the inauguration speech. For ten points, identify this Whig
President."
This is just an example :)
*******************************************************************
(5) What is the difference between CB and Jeopardy!?
First, the obvious: Jeopardy! is a game show that appears on TV, and CB is
a quiz game that is no longer on TV.
OK, now we'll get serious. Jeopardy! is an individual game, CB is a team
game. Also, in J! the difficulty of the "answers" increases with the
dollar amounts, while in CB the difficulty of the questions remains
level throughout the match. In addition, the CB questions are generally
harder than J! questions: the average CB tossup read in its entirety would
rate at or above the $600 level on J!. Another huge difference between CB
and J!: in J!, you must wait until Alex Trebeck finishes reading to buzz
in, while in CB you can buzz in at any time while or after the question is
read.
******************************************************************
(6) Is there a contact list of CB club presidents?
Actually, there is a list maintained for contacts for CB and ACF programs
nationwide. The current custodians of this list are Pat Matthews
<matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu> and Randy Buehler
<bueh...@ctrvax.vanderbilt.edu>. To obtain a copy, e-mail Pat or Randy at
their listed address.
************************************************************************
(7) How did CB start?
"College Bowl was created by Don Reid." Started on Radio in 1953, ended on
television in 1970 (after giving up an afternoon slot for a shot at prime
time as a summer replacement series), continued on CBS Radio with Art
Fleming as host until about 1983. Its main TV sponsor was General Electric.
Of its three TV hosts, Allen Ludden was its most famous.
Until 1977, teams played whoever was scheduled to appear next week.
A team that won five consecutive games was proclaimed an undefeated
champion, given a silver bowl, and, during the television era, banned
from further TV appearances for three years. The national champion format
started with the joint venture with ACUI around 1977. This format has
been televised once by NBC and for two years by Disney.
There has been talk from time to time about taking CB to an international
level, but the last time this happened was in 1979, when national champs
Davidson College took on the English champs. Some suspect that American
colleges would have a hard time competing against many foreign schools,
whose students tend to be both older and more experienced in their fields
than their American counterparts.
There is an English counterpart to CB. It's called University Challenge,
and it airs (or used to air) on Granada Television.
*********************************************************************
(8) What makes a question "good"? (See also Question 11a.)
A good question is one that is both fair and moves from obscurity to clarity.
A question is "fair" if it is not intentionally misleading. An example of
a misleading question is: "Giants Stadium is the only stadium home to two
NFL teams, but for ten points, name the only state home to two Federal
Reserve Banks." This question is unfair because the two pieces of
information, Giants Stadium and the Federal Reserve, are totally
unrelated. This question would have been "fair", however, if it had asked
which teams played in Giants Stadium or asked which city Giants Stadium is in.
A tossup question should have 2 or 3 pieces of information, and they
should be presented in such a manner as to take the question from
obscurity to clarity. For example, if a question has 3 clues then after the
first clue only the exceptional player should be able to answer it, after
the second a good player should be able to make an educated guess, and
after the third clue only one or two possible answers should remain.
There are exceptions to this rule. The first is the spelling question. In
these questions, the answer is to spell a word. In these, the word to be
spelled *must* be one of the first 4-5 words of the question in order to
be fair. Another exception is the "quickie" question. An example would be
"For a quick ten points, what is the capital of Kansas." These questions
reward speed and players who can adjust their tempo quickly. However,
"quickie" questions should not be overused: in CB packets, there should be
no more than 3, and ACF discourages the use of any quickies.
For tossups, the CB rule of thumb is that a tossup read in its entirety
should be answerable by most of the players. In ACF, all questions should
be difficult for anybody to answer.
*****************************************************************
(9) What is a good way to recruit people or get a club started?
If you are interested in starting up a new CB club at your school, the
first thing to do is call your student activities office. Ask if your
school has ever been involved in CB, and if so which faculty or
administrators were involved. Also ask how one goes about getting
school funding for student activities. The next thing to do is to contact
CBI, at phone number 1-800-234-BOWL (or 818-788-4103). They have a wealth of
information and can walk you through the official mumbo-jumbo. The next
thing to do is to find a faculty person or administrator who is willing to
be your "coach" or do some behind-the-scenes work for you. Next, find a few
people who are interested in CB and who are willing to put in work to
promote the club and the activity at your school. If you can secure funding
for 10 or more packets of questions from CBI (10 packets will cost a new
program in the area of $500), order them and set up a campus tournament
for your school. Be careful about this: you will need a few game officials,
and you have to be careful to avoid conflicts of interest. A typical
campus tournament runs 1-2 competition rooms at the same time, and each
room should have at least 2 game officials (2 is all you need: one to read
and judge, another to keep score and time). Conflicts of interest are
harder to avoid. If the club runs the tournament, it is best if the
director and other game officials of the tournament not participate in it. If
the director or other officials do participate, you will have to sequester
the questions carefully so that the director and these officials do not
see the questions they will play on before their matches.
[At Penn the club runs the campus tournament, but it is structured so that
all game officials may play as well because we strictly sequester the
questions used. For help in scheduling matches and sequestering, contact
Pat Matthews at matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu.]
There is another way to start up a CB program, but you cannot play in
your CB RCT the first year if you do it. However, you may participate
fully in ACF RCT and, if you make it, the ACF NCT. The first year, get a
group of people together to form a club, and send teams to invitationals at
other schools. You may or may not be able to get funding for this,
depending on your school's policies. After this, apply to your school for CBI
packets the next year, saying that you have a club already in place and
that you are ready to take CB to your entire school. [Note: almost every CB
program gets the money to buy CBI packets either from their school, an outside
sponsor, or a combination of both. There have been cases where individulas
purchase the questions themselves, but this an option left only to those
willing and able to pay the hefty $48-60 per packet.]
To set up an ACF program, contact Peter Freeman at pet...@oddjob.uchicago.edu.
To recruit players for an already existing program, the first decision you
have to make is whether you want a year-round club or not. Many schools
run a campus tournament, and then just send the winning team to their RCT
(and if it wins the RCT, it gets sent to the NCT). Other schools, which
tend to do better at the national level, maintain year-round clubs, which
sends teams to invitationals and practices year-round, and may even
conduct more than one campus tournament.
A good way to recruit for a year-round program is to find out from your
admissions department who participated in academic competition in high
school, and target those individuals. However, there is a problem with
this method: many potentially good players may not have had the
opportunity or the inclination to play in high school, but may want to
play in college. So, the absolute *best* way is to go all out to promote
your campus tournament, and to have it as early in the year as possible,
before people commit to other activities.
Once you've promoted and run your campus tourney, you have another
decision to make: do you want entry to the club to be competitive or not?
At some schools, all participants in the campus tourney are invited to
join the club, although standing on travelling teams is based on merit.
Some schools do this, but target particularly the best players in the
campus tourney. At other schools, the best players from the campus tourney
try out for as many spots as are open in the club/travelling teams. It is
up to your program to decide how to do it.
************************************************************************
(9a) How do I run the campus tournament?
As stated before, the campus tournament should be the cornerstone of your
recruitment effort, and as such it should be run well and promoted to your
entire student.
The first thing you should do is to plan out on which date(s) you will
have your event. There is no strict rule as to how your event must be
structured: it is entirely up to your program. The things to keep in mind
in planning the campus tourney:
a. How many teams do you expect will play
b. How many rooms you will want to run at the same time
c. How many game officials will be available, and at what times
d. Will any participants also serve as officials
e. What format will you want (round-robin, single elimination, double
elimination, modified or hybrid forms of the above)
f. Are there any campus events that you want to avoid conflicts with
g. What kind of publicity will you generate, and will campus and/or local
TV/Radio/newspapers cover you
Most of these issues are discussed in the _College Bowl Campus Program
Information Guide_, available free from CBI. Sample scoresheets,
tournament charts, promotional materials, a rules quiz for game officials,
and other useful info are in the guide.
The second thing you must do is figure out how you are going to pay for
the campus tourney. If you do it by the book, every question you use
should be bought from CBI, and these packets cost $48-$60 each. Plus, you
will have to pay for some photocopying scoresheets and rules, posters,
possibly an ad in your campus newspaper, possibly food/soda for your game
officials, possibly prizes, etc. Many schools have some sort of funding
mechanism for student activities, and that should be your first stop. In
addition, a few programs have succeeded in getting local businesses to
sponsor or co-sponsor the campus tourney.
Once you have these figured out, order the questions from CBI. It is
imperative that you complete steps one and two *very* much in advance of
the actual campus tourney. A good time to hold it is in October or
November, so you should finish the planning stage preferably by September
1, and ideally before everyone goes home for the summer. This is for two
reasons: first, advance planning makes the event easier to run; second,
you will qualify for the early order discount on questions.
There are many other tasks which you must complete for your campus tourney
to be a success, and they may be performed either while or after the
aforementioned tasks are completed.
An extremely important task is the recruitment of game officials. They
must be impartial, have a thorough knowledge of the game and its rules,
and be firm in their decisions, but they must not be afraid to admit
mistakes or be so rigid that they will not uphold a valid protest. If you
have no experienced game officials at your disposal, there are three
things that you can do. The first is to train officials yourself. Have
them read the materials from game officials that CBI sends in its annual
mailings to the schools, and take them through simulated matches. Make
sure they know the rules *COMPLETELY*. Another option is to call
neighboring schools CB program and see if they can send you some game
officials. A third option is to call your ACUI region coordinator. They
have lists of volunteers in your region who help out for the RCT, and you
may be able to persuade some of these people to help you out for your
campus tourney (but don't count on it).
Another key task is to get the necessary equipment (see question 10). You
will need as many buzzer systems as rooms, and any clocks that you use
should be countdown timers that are visible to the players and game
officials. If your program does not already have a buzzer system, it
should buy one (and depending on the size of your program, you may need a
second system). Borrowing a system is possible, but very difficult, as
they are not cheap (a buzzer system ordered through CBI costs ca. $500).
However, you may be able to borrow the equipment of a neighboring school,
and your regional coordinator may be able to loan you a system as well.
For help and advice for any aspect of tournament planning, do not hesitate
to ask the editor of this list (Pat Matthews, matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu)
************************************************************************
(10) What equipment do I need to play CB?
To properly play a CB match, you will need a room that is relatively quiet
and free from outside noise, a lockout buzzer system, paper and pencils,
and a clock. All of the above, with the exception of the clock, are
required for ACF matches.
Buzzer systems can be purchased from CBI, but they cost ca. $500. There
are alternatives to the system sold by CBI, but the editor does not know
how they are obtained. A program or two has succeded in the past in
building their own lockout systems, but this is an option only for those
who have the knowledge, materials, and time to do it. In addition, a
company called Patrick's Press (1-800-654-1052) makes and sells buzzer
systems.
The lockout system is essential to the game for one reason: it is the best
method of determing which player (among the eight) has actually signalled
first. Each player has some sort of signalling device, and in a lockout
system, once a player has signalled, no one else can signal until the
system has been cleared. Barring malfunction, this eliminates any
arguments about "who rung in first", because once the first player "rings
in," no one else can until the system has been reset.
Typically, when schools host invitationals, the host school usually offers
a discount to schools bringing buzzer systems (and sometimes clocks) to the
tournament.
***********************************************************************
(11) Aside from buying questions from CBI, how can I get more questions to
use in practice?
The first answer is: write them on your own (see question 11a). Getting your
players to write questions is a very good way to both develop playing
skills and to expose the team to new knowledge, as well as generate more
practice material. For example, if you have a 15-member club (14 players
and one coach) and each person wrote one packet per month, that would be a
total of 180 new packets for the year. If these questions are used in
practice, the team may learn many things they did not know before. Also,
writing questions and using them in practice is an excellent way to keep
the club up-to-date with current events and other happenings. In addition,
becoming a good question writer can be helpful to playing skills. While
playing, a good question writer often has a better sense of where a
question is leading, and thus may be better able to anticipate the answer.
The second answer: trade with other schools. Many schools maintain question
libraries, and are willing to trade, sell, and sometimes give away
questions. Be careful, however: questions from CBI may not be transferred
or duplicated without company permission! Also, be careful about question
sales in general: the host school of a tournament is held to be the owner
of all questions submitted for that tournament, and they have final say on
how those questions are distributed.
The third answer: download them from the CB/ACF anonymous ftp site. Here's
how (from Peter Freeman):
An anonymous ftp site is now available for the deposit and withdrawal of
old CB/ACF tournament sets. I have set up this ftp account so that schools
may utilize the network to get question sets for their practices. Please
do not utilize this resource as a last-minute measure to create question
sets for tournaments; if I hear any complaints about questions being re-used
or mis-used, I will pull the plug immediately.
This ftp site will start with a limited selection; the idea is for those of
you who have held tournaments and who have old sets on a mainframe or on
disk to contribute them. Some schools charge for their sets, though; in
anticipation of this, I have worked out an agreement with BU and Penn to
hold any sets for at least one year (e.g., the ftp site has the 1992 Terrier
Tussle, but not the 1993). I would like to make that a general rule, if
others are willing, i.e. if you charge for your sets, do not send anything
less than a year old.
If you have not used anonymous ftp before, this is how it goes:
yoursystem> ftp -i oddjob.uchicago.edu
You will be prompted for a username. Type "anonymous".
You will then be prompted for a passwd. A passwd is not necessary, but
the standard practice is to type your e-mail address (which then gets
logged in the syslog, I believe).
ftp> cd pub
ftp> cd college_bowl
ftp> ls
You will then have a number of directories to choose from. For instance,
choose acfreg2.93 (ACF Chicago, 2/93).
ftp> cd acfreg2.93
ftp> ls
You then should have a file called README (which lists the schools, and
maybe someday will have final results and individual standings), and
a number of compressed files (i.e. ending in .Z). Each file contains
the toss-ups and boni of a particular team.
If you want all the sets, type:
ftp> binary
ftp> mget *
Because you put the "-i" in the first line up above, the program will
not keep asking you whether you want files; it will assume you want all
of them and will send them all back to your system.
ftp> quit
yoursystem> uncompress *
And voila, you have a number of tourney sets, ready to use for your
next practice.
If there are any problems or comments, or if you would like information on
how to submit old sets, please send e-mail to: pet...@oddjob.uchicago.edu
********************************************************************
(11a) How do I write questions?
Like anything else, the art of question writing is acquired only by
practicing. Most writers have trouble writing good questions on the first
attempt. However, in time, the process becomes easier and more natural.
The best way to start writing CB questions is to read the writing
guidelines written by the Stanford College Bowl Club. They are the most
comprehensive guidelines to date on the subject. (To obtain a copy, send
an email request to Pat Matthews at matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu. It is also
available at the ftp site.)
For ACF question writers, Marc Swisdak of the Maryland Academic Team has
compiled an ACF question writing manual. This manual is available both on
the ftp site and from its author <swi...@wam.umd.edu>.
Then, try writing a few questions.
After writing questions, it's an excellent idea to try them on other
people in your club. This is essential, because it's the best way to get
immediate feedback, and find out what changes should be made.
From Pat Matthews:
"A common complaint of question writers is that they have no
"inspiration"--they have no idea what to write about. My personal method
when I've lost inspiration is first to attack the Sunday edition of the
New York _Times_ for questions, then to go to the encyclopedias. I'll pull
out 7-8 volumes at a time and open to random pages, looking for good stuff
to write questions about."
"Another thing that I do is that I tend to stockpile questions and then
take questions out of my pile to make packets. That way, if I happen to be
using a good source for a particular category, I'll just write down the
questions and use them later. For example, if I were reading a book on the
Civil War, I'd write down as many Civil War related questions as I could
while reading the book. Then, later on, I'd use these questions in other
packets."
"A method used by one of my former Penn colleagues was to carry a small
assignment pad in his backpack. Then, if he ever heard or read something
that was question-worthy, he'd jot it down on the pad. He now writes for CBI."
Here's a tip from Tom Michael:
"Here is a tip on writing good quality questions on a variety of subjects
quickly. This method requires two "sources" (books, magazines, specialty
publications, encyclopedias, general texts, etc.), one of which should be a
general reference work; and a ten sided die. Dice in a variety of shapes,
including non-platonic solids, are available at hobby, wargame, and
bookstores that sell Dungeons & Dragons or other fantasy games. Using the
die, roll a page number for one of your sources. Find something on that
page suitable for a question. Cross-reference the subject in your general
reference work, and write a question using information from both sources.
Using information from two sources allows you to expand the scope
of the question beyond the first reference, and provides a check on the
accuracy of the information. After you have written several questions in
this manner, sort the questions by subject area. Now "balance" the packet
by writing questions on subject areas you are missing."
"This method helps if you are running out of inspiration for questions, or
simply don't have a lot of time. (Note: I hand out one die to each player
at the second practice every year. Some have found it helps to write
questions; others don't use it.)"
********************************************************************
(12) What are the regions for College Bowl competition?
Region 1: ME, NH, VT, MA, CT, RI, Canadian Maritimes
Region 2: NY except for NYC and Long Island, Quebec, Ontario in EST
Region 3: NYC and Long Island, NJ, DE, and southeast PA
Region 4: the rest of PA, MD, WV, northern VA
Region 5: the rest of VA, NC, SC, TN, KY
Region 6: GA, MS, AL, FL
Region 7: OH, lower MI
Region 8: Chicago, WI, and upper MI
Region 9: IL (except Chicago), IN
Region 10: IA, MN, ND, SD, Manitoba, Ontario in CST
Region 11: KS, MO, NE, OK
Region 12: TX, LA, AR
Region 13: AR, UT, WY, NM, CO
Region 14: ID, MT, WA, OR, AK, the rest of Canada
Region 15: CA, NV, HI, Guam
*Region 16: Australia, New Zealand, Far East
Region 16 has never sent a team to the NCT since the Campus Program began.
Note: ACF has "regionals", but they are not based on formal geographic
breakdowns, but rather on what schools are willing to host them and
relative proximity between these schools.
************************************************************************
(12a) Who are the defending regional champions?
Region School
-------------------------------------------------
1 Harvard
2 State University of New York - Albany
3 University of Pennsylvania
4 The George Washington University
5 University of Virginia
6 Berry College
7 Michigan
8 University of Chicago
9 University of Illinois - Urbana
10 University of Minnesota
11 Washington University in St. Louis
12 Rice University
13 Brigham Young University
14 University of Puget Sound
15 Stanford
************************************************************************
(13) What schools have won the National Championship?
For CB, since the beginning of the campus program.
For ACF, from 1993 (first ACF NCT).
YEAR CB ACF
------------------------------------------------------------------------
1978 Stanford University
1979 Davidson College
1980 California State - Fresno
1981 University of Maryland
1982 U. of North Carolina - Chapel Hill
1983 not held
1984 University of Minnesota
1985 not held
1986 U. of Wisconsin - Madison
1987 University of Minnesota
1988 North Carolina State University
1989 University of Minnesota
1990 University of Chicago
1991 Rice University
1992 Massachusetts Inst. of Tech.
1993 University of Virginia University of Chicago
HCASC Champions:
Year School
----------------------------------------
1991 Norfolk State University
1992 Tuskegee University
*********************************************************************
(13a) How does a school get to Nationals?
For CB, it's simple. The 15 region winners go. In addition, one randomly
selected second place team goes as the wild card, making a 16-team field.
In the event that a region winner cannot attend, the region's #2 team goes
in its place, and so on.
For ACF its slightly more complicated. ACF has a few regional tournaments,
at which the top few finishers at each qualify for nationals. In addition,
the hosts of each regional tournament and some ACF-registered
invitationals receive automatic bids. Also, teams can receive automatic
bids for good performances at invitationals. Finally, if there are any
slots available, the ACF committee will accept appeals for consideration.
*********************************************************************
(14) What schools normally host invitationals, and when are they?
There are many schools that host invitationals, in addition to CBI and ACF
regionals and nationals. Pat Matthews compiles a list of tournaments that
is posted regularly to alt.college.college-bowl. If you want a copy
emailed to you, write Pat at matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu.
--
"Young Patrick" Matthews matt...@eniac.seas.upenn.edu
314 South 40th Street Penn Band Flag-Waver Extraordinaire
Philadelphia, PA 19104 Penn College Bowl Foreign Minister
(215) 382-2491 Owner, East Norwalk New Originals