Middle School to High School transition

[Lo, Marathon Ham!]

In our region, we run a very successful MS tourney with many middle schoolers coming out to compete. But I have noticed that most of them drop playing quiz bowl once they enter high school. The result is that we are the only high school that is really competitive in our state and many middle schoolers involved in quiz bowl who don't come to our school stop participating in quiz bowl. Many of these middle schoolers may be fantastic players (see Paritosh Raval from my grade back when we went to Independence) but choose to leave when they enter high school, many times because their schools don't have experienced teams. Ideas on how this can be fixed?

[Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)]

Isn't it really the case that Delaware only has about 1 team in high school that is actually what one may call super serious (yours), and a bunch of teams that do a TV thing with a couple who show up to a few tournaments otherwise? That's your problem right there, high school freshmen can't be expected to continue playing quizbowl if they aren't given access to a team that is willing to practice and attend tournaments routinely.

[Schmidt Sting Pain Index]

Isn't it really the case that Delaware only has about 1 team in high school that is actually what one may call super serious (yours), and a bunch of teams that do a TV thing with a couple who show up to a few tournaments otherwise? That's your problem right there, high school freshmen can't be expected to continue playing quizbowl if they aren't given access to a team that is willing to practice and attend tournaments routinely.

The TV-thing doesn't exist anymore, so its us and maybe a couple other teams that might go to stuff hosted by UDel or us. The middle school circuit is quite lively however, and we have plans for major competitive expansion in the near future. But like Mohan has said, we are not really sure how to make the high school circuit more active. Looking at the middle school circuit, it shouldn't be that hard to continue it on to the high school level (also considering that many schools had active teams a couple years ago, we can assume there are not many administrations barriers). Right now, we try and help spread awareness of quizbowl tournaments and study resources to middle schoolers, but what other steps can be taken?

Thanks

[Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)]

Well, it seems to me like what needs to happen first and foremost is that coaches need to be found at other schools so that incoming middle schoolers have a team to join, and unfortunately I don't think that you guys are in a great position to do that, given that you are high schoolers who don't go to any of those schools. You always can and should attempt to contact every school out there when you plan tournaments and find out if there are any coach contacts that you can cull, but otherwise, it seems to me like your only real shot at changing anything is to talk to your middle schooler friends and try to convince them to find coaches at their future high schools.

[Victor Prieto]

I've been trying to start up a quizbowl club at my old school since last summer, but the first two teachers that I approached are leaving the school. I'm now trying to do it from the bottom up, to get a group of students interested and then have them search for a coach. I met Paritosh when I visited a month ago, he's been helping me a little. I'm hoping to have a club formed for tournaments in the fall.

Isn't it really the case that Delaware only has about 1 team in high school that is actually what one may call super serious (yours), and a bunch of teams that do a TV thing with a couple who show up to a few tournaments otherwise?

That TV thing died a few years ago, I think. Tower Hill certainly hasn't had something like that in the past 10 years. The problem isn't overthrowing an existing bad quizbowl organization, it's that there's just nothing going on. Honestly, there's a huge opportunity for outreach efforts in Delaware.

It's funny, from the title, I was expecting something entirely different when I opened this thread.

[Lo, Marathon Ham!]

I've been trying to start up a quizbowl club at my old school since last summer, but the first two teachers that I approached are leaving the school. I'm now trying to do it from the bottom up, to get a group of students interested and then have them search for a coach. I met Paritosh when I visited a month ago, he's been helping me a little. I'm hoping to have a club formed for tournaments in the fall.

I certainly hope that Tower Hill is able to get a team going! They have a lot of potential to be successful especially with someone as knowledgeable as Paritosh.

The problem isn't overthrowing an existing bad quizbowl organization, it's that there's just nothing going on. Honestly, there's a huge opportunity for outreach efforts in Delaware.

We've tried to do outreach in the area with not much luck. Hopefully Mr. Madden's NHBB returns to Delaware; it was nice to see some new teams like Wilmington Friends and Sanford participating. This seems like a good transition to the pyramidal format. Additionally, I think the use of A sets or more novice tournaments might help, but a big problem is that when teams in DE compete against teams that come in from other places, they usually get beaten by a lot and as a result quite disheartened. I'm not sure what a good way around this would be, but I hope to see a DE state championship (maybe later this year but probably not) hopefully again next year. At least we don't have a problem. But I wish we would have a better field here in DE so that our travels (as far up as Boston, as far down as Virginia) could be reduced, so that we could play a good field without having to drive 2 - 7 hours. One thing I was thinking but wanted to get some feedback to was having a new team similar to ACF to promote new teams to come out and hopefully get some of the people who used to play in middle school involved. Thoughts?