Protectiveness over Resources

[WhatScience?]

As someone who seeks private exchanges while supporting public ones as well (NOTE: I will be uploading to the exchange soon) I can say this...it is far more common to trade sets than to trade lone tests..just the way it is...however to start, one might have to go individuals but eventually...sets are the way to go.

[Random Human]

As someone who seeks private exchanges while supporting public ones as well (NOTE: I will be uploading to the exchange soon) I can say this...it is far more common to trade sets than to trade lone tests..just the way it is...however to start, one might have to go individuals but eventually...sets are the way to go.

Go to an invite, or ask everyone in your school to write a set. From there, trade for more sets. Use those traded sets to trade for more. This time around, I have approximately 30-40 sets. At the end of last year, I ended up with like 60 or so... But, taking them is the most important

[WhatScience?]

As someone who seeks private exchanges while supporting public ones as well (NOTE: I will be uploading to the exchange soon) I can say this...it is far more common to trade sets than to trade lone tests..just the way it is...however to start, one might have to go individuals but eventually...sets are the way to go.

Go to an invite, or ask everyone in your school to write a set. From there, trade for more sets. Use those traded sets to trade for more. This time around, I have approximately 30-40 sets. At the end of last year, I ended up with like 60 or so... But, taking them is the most important

That moment when you are waiting for the forum to explode.....

[EastStroudsburg13]

Yeah, this thread is dangerously close to being locked.

[WhatScience?]

Yeah, this thread is dangerously close to being locked.

pls don't ... as someone who sees and has recently been working to improve both sides (Citing my work on the discord server for the community)....it is very entertaining

[syo_astro]

Yeah, this thread is dangerously close to being locked.

pls don't ... as someone who sees and has recently been working to improve both sides (Citing my work on the discord server for the community)....it is very entertaining

Just wanted to point out you probably don't mean "entertaining", unless you did? Confused me a bit.

Skink made a good post, and I can engage with good discussion with him. I also agree with him that we shouldn't vilify anyone on the forums, and many posts relating to keeping resources private vs. sharing resources / posting help have been too...well, you know.

I don't agree with everything Skink said, but I don't have the time to make a long post. Summarizing, I don't think the MAIN result of private trades is networking and mutual respect. I (for example) also was around when trades between competitive teams / in-state were effectively never done. Maybe things have changed, but things are never perfect. I find often this is because trades are primarily based on assumptions or thinking focused on competitiveness and not helping each other / altruism. Not mutually exclusive, and I am well aware people have different philosophies. Still, it's different to get something out of one view or another (e.g. networking, respect, etc).

All that said, RandomHuman posted something that's already been stated multiple times and didn't really relate to what WhatScience? said. Threads don't normally get locked, but if people can't be respectful (whether it involve not making personal attacks or already stated / irrelevant points), then it makes sense. [This is in the site rules!]

[jonathanzhang53]

ZOOO WEEEE MAMAMAMA

I did not know this thread existed. Our school has probably spent a cumulative of about 3-4 hours test trading and have access to about 60 tests. Got like 10 from just surfing the web and test exchange. 15 or so came from a leak on forums. 10 or so came from a private source (teammate knew someone). There was a zip with like 40 on it.

ez. anyone can do it.

EDIT: no tests were given in return for anything lol.

[WhatScience?]

ZOOO WEEEE MAMAMAMA

I did not know this thread existed. Our school has probably spent a cumulative of about 3-4 hours test trading and have access to about 60 tests. Got like 10 from just surfing the web and test exchange. 15 or so came from a leak on forums. 10 or so came from a private source (teammate knew someone). There was a zip with like 40 on it.

ez. anyone can do it.

EDIT: no tests were given in return for anything lol.

A leak on the forums. Sounds interesting.

Lmaooo

[drcubbin]

This is certainly a lively discussion and for good reason. The test exchange exists because, like it or not, many ES use old questions - in fact, complete old tests - instead of making up newer, more challenging questions. One solution - I do not know if it is possible, but I think a good deal of these problems could be solved if ES were able to know much earlier what the events would be and to get their hands on an early printing of the manual. For example, say if those who write the tests (teachers & college students) had the manual around the same time as the Summer Institute or Coach's Weekend were being given, they would have more time to write a fresh, clean and previously-unseen test worthy of those who have put the time in to study, rather than have students feel "pressured" into doing Kaplaneske reviews of old tests and hoping they see familiar tests questions (or completely whole previous tests)! I know from personal experience that writing 4 tests - 2 Invitationals, 1 Regional and 1 State takes A LOT of time of of one's weekends/vacations in order to come up with new material (especially for the lab component)! Personally, if I had the summer to work on test creation, I think I could put together a better test. But that's just me and maybe I am overlooking something - which is often the case

[Name]

This is certainly a lively discussion and for good reason. The test exchange exists because, like it or not, many ES use old questions - in fact, complete old tests - instead of making up newer, more challenging questions. One solution - I do not know if it is possible, but I think a good deal of these problems could be solved if ES were able to know much earlier what the events would be and to get their hands on an early printing of the manual. For example, say if those who write the tests (teachers & college students) had the manual around the same time as the Summer Institute or Coach's Weekend were being given, they would have more time to write a fresh, clean and previously-unseen test worthy of those who have put the time in to study, rather than have students feel "pressured" into doing Kaplaneske reviews of old tests and hoping they see familiar tests questions (or completely whole previous tests)! I know from personal experience that writing 4 tests - 2 Invitationals, 1 Regional and 1 State takes A LOT of time of of one's weekends/vacations in order to come up with new material (especially for the lab component)! Personally, if I had the summer to work on test creation, I think I could put together a better test. But that's just me and maybe I am overlooking something - which is often the case

If a event supervisor gives certain schools access to the list of events early, that school will have a massive advantage. Also how would the event materials be distributed to all the test writer (again with no chance of leaking)? Also some of the test writers (especially in smaller competitors) are the coaches of teams, who would almost always release the rules to thier team