The Quizbowl Resource Center

naqt.com wrote:NAQT has announced tentative logistics details for the 2019 Intercollegiate Championship Tournament, powered by LetterOne, which will be held on April 5-6, 2019 at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare hotel near Chicago.

Full details

At what locations might a team hypothetically qualify for the 2019 Intercollegiate Championship Tournament?

At the SCT on Saturday, February 9th. We're working on confirming SCT sites and plan to post a complete list in the near future.

One thing that I would love NAQT to consider for future years is how the late announcement of SCT sites can affect schools. For example, Kenyon's budget for next semester was due this past weekend. I have to include the expected travel distance and location of the competition when requesting funds, so not knowing where we will be traveling to makes that impossible.

Lauren's post is Good.

NAQT should also keep in mind that certain circuits require aggressive outreach to obtain a decent field, which is much easier to do when you have an official tournament announcement.

One more thing: even if some sites still aren't decided, there seems to be literally no downside to announcing partial sites. Whatever slight decrease in professionalism would result frim slapping a TBA on a region, it would be massively weighed out by giving the rest of us time to plan travel and promote tournaments.

Last five SCT announcements, with site announcement timelines reconstructed as best as I can determine:

2014: sites announced starting mid October to early December
2015: sites announced starting early November through... January, kind of (weird stuff happened this year)
2016: sites announced starting early December through early January
2017: sites announced starting late December through early January
2018: sites announced starting early November (most of them) through early December (two late sites)
2019: no sites announced, it is currently early December

Few things I would like to say:

1. As Lauren has pointed out, NAQT is putting unnecessary strain on schools by announcing sites so late. This may indirectly affect total number of teams attending SCT sites across the country, as Matt has pointed out, so NAQT is shooting itself in the foot here (as it has every year this happened).
2. NAQT SCT, as one of the fundamental tournaments on the collegiate circuit, is guaranteed to occur every year on the same one or two weekends as it has since 1998.
3. Because of that fact, I do not understand why SCT sites cannot be decided by November 1st every year. I don't know the site selection process since host calls were only posted for 2014, 2015 and 2018 from the above list, and I'm not insisting that the selection process be made public, but I do know that the process has been unsatisfactory for teams many times.
4. I would like to know, however, why SCT announcements have not been consistently announced at least three months in advance. If NAQT has announced sites so late year after year because they have difficulty finding hosts in a region, or trouble getting commitments from three months in advance, that would be helpful information (because then the responsibility falls partly on the community, too).

It's disappointing that NAQT still cannot organize SCT sites in a reasonable timeframe. Whose responsibility is it to manage this process?

Is there any reason that NAQT cannot do what essentially every other set producer does and allow hosts to announce mirrors as they are confirmed?

NAQT would like to apologize to the quizbowl community for the delay in announcing sites for the 2019 SCT. We recognize that delayed announcements interfere with teams' ability to plan travel for February, and make it difficult or impossible for some teams to attend the SCT.

I'll start a new thread announcing the 2019 SCT sites that are currently confirmed. Going forward, Conor's suggestion that we announce each site as soon as the host is confirmed is a good one.

Preliminary D-values for the 2019 ICT are now available on naqt.com (Division I, Division II)

Please let us know ([email protected]) in the next 24 hours if any corrections need to be made; we expect to announce invitations for the 2019 ICT tomorrow (Thursday) evening.

Why is it that Colgate was offered a hosting autobid? My understanding (though I will admit I wasn’t there) was that CYPRAS, not the Colgate club, provided both the TD and a large portion of the staff.

Our understanding of the situation is that Colgate's Division I players helped staff the tournament rather than playing (which is why Colgate did not field a Division I team at an SCT taking place on their own campus).

Qualifying for the ICT wrote: Note that merely being the site of an SCT (and providing rooms) is not sufficient to earn an autobid: The host program must, in general, provide the tournament director, organize the event, and take responsibility for ensuring the event is fully staffed.

According to the hosts list, the TD for the tournament was Scott Kroner from CYPRAS, and the tournament announcement poster and main contact were both Scott Kroner of CYPRAS. Could NAQT please clarify its rules about Tier 3 Hosting Autobids?

Also, could someone with knowledge of this SCT tell us who "[organized] the event"?

Important Bird Area wrote: ↑Tue Feb 26, 2019 2:25 pm Our understanding of the situation is that Colgate's Division I players helped staff the tournament rather than playing (which is why Colgate did not field a Division I team at an SCT taking place on their own campus).

person361 wrote: ↑Tue Feb 26, 2019 9:34 pm According to the hosts list, the TD for the tournament was Scott Kroner from CYPRAS, and the tournament announcement poster and main contact were both Scott Kroner of CYPRAS. Could NAQT please clarify its rules about Tier 3 Hosting Autobids?

Also, could someone with knowledge of this SCT tell us who "[organized] the event"?

What Jeff said is correct. Scott Kroner was the TD and Colgate had a majority of their players (besides 1 house team to account for a drop in D2) staff the tournament.

person361 wrote: ↑Tue Feb 26, 2019 9:34 pm

Qualifying for the ICT wrote: Note that merely being the site of an SCT (and providing rooms) is not sufficient to earn an autobid: The host program must, in general, provide the tournament director, organize the event, and take responsibility for ensuring the event is fully staffed.

According to the hosts list, the TD for the tournament was Scott Kroner from CYPRAS, and the tournament announcement poster and main contact were both Scott Kroner of CYPRAS. Could NAQT please clarify its rules about Tier 3 Hosting Autobids?

The "in general" part of that sentence is intended to allow us some flexibility in the use of hosting bids in cases of divided responsibility between the institution physically hosting an SCT and an external tournament director. Our highest priority is the last point listed: "take responsibility for ensuring the event is fully staffed." In this case, Colgate's Division I players gave up the opportunity to play at SCT in order to staff a tournament that otherwise would have had difficulty recruiting enough staff for a seventeen-team field. We believe that it was appropriate to reward them with a bid to the 2019 ICT.

Thanks for clarifying!

I have set up a private discussion forum for the 2019 ICT; you can request access via your user control panel.

Podcasts are now available of selected matches from the 2019 ICT.