Sic Semper Trashis 2024: April 20 in Bristol, VA

[TusculumPearson]

We once again announce and invite registrations for the annual Southwest Virginia Academic Team Alliance (SWATA) trash tournament fundraiser, Sic Semper Trashis 2024, which will be held at Virginia High School in Bristol, Virginia on April 20.

This will, as usual, be a mirror of Bob Kilner’s Ohio Trash tournament, and will serve as an end-of-year gathering and celebration, open to all high schools and trash enthusiasts across the Southeast (and beyond). Secondarily, it will serve as a money-making endeavor for our Southwest Virginia teams preparing for trips to national competitions (HSNCT, SSNCT, IPNCT, PACE NSC in 2025). 2023’s competition raised in excess of $1600 to be distributed this year; we hope for greater returns this year.

Read more, or go ahead and register:
<https://forms.gle/mRjaB6uWoMM2P4AY9>


LOGISTICS
Our host school again is Virginia High School in Bristol, Virginia. The school is located approximately 5 minutes off Interstate 81’s Exit 3 or Exit 5, depending on whether you are coming from the north or south. The school is located at 1200 Long Crescent Drive, Bristol, VA 24201.

Our game plan is to start registration at 7:45 AM and hold a general meeting at 8:30, with a 9:00 AM start time.

There will be a high school only division as well as an open/college division. If you are a high school student, you are permitted to compete in the open division, but as always, be aware that the piranha in the open division do not care about the age of the meat upon which they will feed.

Per usual, there are no trophies, only prizes. Prizes will be (a) cheap and (b) trashy.


FEES
Inflation has arrived for us all, but we maintain our tournament philosophy. All fees can be negotiated to an extent, with two tenets in mind:
(A) Particularly for high schools, we want players to be able to play and not have money be an obstacle.
(B) This is a fundraiser for our students. If you are able to pay full price, pay full price. If you feel led to toss some extra coins in the coffer, the funds are going straight to SWVA schools playing nationals.
With those principles in mind, this is our fee structure:

High School Teams (inflation finally catches up to you):
$70 for first team from a high school
$65 for each additional team from same high school
$20 per free agent from a high school
-$10 discount *per Virginia school* that has not played a non-VHSL tournament in the past 5 years
-$10 discount *per Tennessee School* that has not played a non-TV event in the past 5 years

(We can negotiate a similar discount for Kentucky and North Carolina schools that want to join us. Y’all come.)

Open/College Teams (we’re fundraising, dig deep):
$120 per team
$40 per free agent

Discounts:
-$10 for staff supplied (staffers need to fill out a separate registration: <https://forms.gle/PSKmcQoGNi43Dw4Z8>)
-$5 for buzzers supplied (limit 2 discounts)

Open/College team minimum: $90, no HS team minimum.

If your school needs a break on fees in order to compete, please contact the tournament director. If your open team wants a break on fees in order to compete, consider the kids and dig deep.


SET
We have been incredibly fortunate to be associated with Bob Kilner’s Ohio Trash set for the duration of this tournament’s history. In many ways, Kilner’s tireless work has been essential to making this event what it is - the questions are always appropriate for the player base and enjoyable to play. We remain grateful for this association.


CONTACT
The returning tournament director for SST 2024 is Chuck Pearson, with the support of and other SWATA executives and members. Contact Pearson through Facebook (https://facebook.com/chuck.pearson) or by email at [email protected].

Host contact is Mr. Noah Ashbrook ([email protected]), with support from Cristal Morales.


REGISTER NOW
<https://forms.gle/mRjaB6uWoMM2P4AY9>


DISCLAIMER
Some information is subject to change, if changes occur, they will be posted on this thread.

And, as always, in the words of the genial quizmaster, all decisions of the tournament director are arbitrary, capricious, and final.

It may be April 20, but our appreciation of pop culture quizbowl is clean and sober. And you never knew clean and sober could be such fun.

Come and join us.

[TusculumPearson]

At this point in time there are seven registered staffers for Sic Semper Trashis.

Teams, through their individual registrations, have promised additional staffers that could make the tournament viable right now, but those staffers have not registered and made their contact information known to me.

We're additionally hurt by the reality that a couple of the region's better staffers are signed up to play the event, rather than read. I'm torn on how to feel about this. On the one hand, it's a fundraising tournament, and we'll benefit from the funds. On the other, the tournament can't run without the volunteer staffers, and the lack of staffers diminishes the event.

At this time I'm going to encourage everybody who's able to staff in support of Sic Semper Trashis to make themselves known. If we remain in this situation at this time next week, I won't have too many other options other than canceling the event.

Again: the staffer registration is available through this Google Form.

Thanks so much.

[eldermaas]

Can you give an update on the number of teams registered in relation to the 7 staffers? Expecting 14 teams with 7 staffers is different than expecting 30+ teams (2023's field?) with 7 staffers

[GallatinGOAT2020]

Echoing the above, about how many staffers do we need to come up with to make this tournament viable?

[TusculumPearson]

Making the tournament viable? We now have 'em. Southwest Virginia stepped up large the past couple of days; the region recognizes the importance of this tournament to them and staff came in to support. Again, the biggest concern I had was that teams had promised staffers and I hadn't heard hide nor hair from the staffers, and I don't want to count on what I don't have contact with.

Making the tournament good? Right now I need one or two additional readers and, say, three to six more scorekeepers to be able to run the tournament at the quality I've kept the thing at in the past. I do have teams wanting in the field, and I don't have the staff to support them right now.

Field? Holy cats, there's no field link in here (I blame the brain fog associated with the pace of the day job). Here,
have a field. 14 high school teams and 9-10 open teams (depending on whether the free agent farm gets running mates or if the free agent tries to play solo). We had 7 staffers on Wednesday; we're up to 16 staffers (not counting backroom support) now.

Thanks for your patience, and sorry I felt the need to bark. Especially since it's a fundraising event, the volunteer support is absolutely invaluable, and I'm thankful for the response (especially from SWVA) the past couple of days.

chuck

[TusculumPearson]

I never get these updates posted anywhere near in as timely a fashion as I want to; however, we've had a bit of flux over the past couple of days, so I'm OK getting this out late. News and timing!

FRIDAY NIGHT
...is tomorrow night, and it might be late to put this together! However, a couple of the old heads and I will seek out an evening dinner engagement in Bristol, possibly at the same Mellow Mushroom where we met last year! Send me a message (preferably via social media, although I'll check messages on hsquizbowl too) if you're interested.

SATURDAY PARKING AND MEETUP
The listed address of Virginia High School is 650 Long Crescent Drive; however, mapping directions to 70 Hammack Drive on Google Maps or Apple Maps does a better job of pinpointing the parking lot you’re likely going to want to use.

When you enter Virginia High, as is customary for our events there, we’ll use the cafeteria (straight to your left as you enter by the front door) as our registration and gathering place.

REGISTRATION AND SCHEDULE
The high school schedule is uncommonly straightforward. Sixteen teams, split into two groups of eight. Seven-match round robin, no byes. Reseed after Round 7 for playoff groups, match against the top team in your group carries over to the playoff group of four. We'll break ties after awards if we have to, but any team a game clear of the field will be the high school champion.

For open people: this is where this year's event will get a little funky.

We're on eleven teams. I want to be judicious in how we maximize other teams' games and minimize byes to get everybody a minimum of eight rounds competitive. So right now the format I'm working with for the open division is a nine-round INCOMPLETE ROUND ROBIN. Two teams will get nine games; the other nine teams will get eight.

We will have a playoff for the open division after awards, on a maximum of two full packets, and any team within A GAME AND A HALF of the top seed will get a chance to compete in it. We'll have the ruleset for that prepared for release within the next 24 hours.

As is traditional for SST, doors open at 7:45 AM. General meeting at 8:30 AM. We expect games starting at 9:00.

We will bust tail to get through five rounds before lunch. It's not as necessary as in years past - the reseed isn't until Round 7 for the high schoolers - but it still helps the day to get done smoother.

Eight rounds is the guarantee, but all high school teams will get nine and most open teams will get nine one way or another.

Any questions, hit me up through the social media channels or by [email protected].

LUNCH
We did a lunch onsite for this thing once upon a time. We haven't since COVID, and we sure aren't going to try on 27 teams. Bristol's fast food emporiums along US 11 and I-81 (around Exits 5 and 7) are quite open to you. Save the fancy sit-downs for dinner.

WE MISS YOU, JEREMY ALEXANDER TABOR
The old tournament director and music-game master is on to bigger and better things, but we miss him around here, and it needs to be restated from time to time.

ADDITIONAL DISCLAIMERS
We're still going over the day's plans with the fine toothed comb, but the day job has been overly taxing this season. I'm more nervous about something going wrong on the day than usual. Your patience with the operation will be appreciated.

If at all possible - stay for the awards. We're going to have some recognition for those who have played and who will play nationals this year, and there will be additional kudos handed out on the day as well. This will be about honoring Southwest Virginia's finest.

Thanks so much for everybody's patience, and as always: come for the good company and the games full of laughs, and if something works out well on the day, we'll take that as a win too.

See you on Saturday.

[TusculumPearson]

WE HAVE A FIELD

It's accessible by short URL at bit.ly/SicSemper2024.

Building is now open. See you shortly!

chuck