Trial Events-Does your team do them?

[pumptato-cat]

Does your team participate in trial events? If so, why? Does it help with team performance for future years? (I've noticed some new events show up in trials the year before)

[Jehosaphat]

Back when I competed in Science Olympiad, my team regularly participated in trial events. Usually, our alternates competed in trial events if the tournament allowed them to. I don't have solid data to suggest that it helps our team to climb to new heights in future Science Olympiad seasons, though I do believe there are certainly numerous reasons that giving alternates the opportunity to participate in trials benefits the team later on.

However, regardless of whether it truly bolsters a team's success in the future, in my personal view, the purpose of Science Olympiad should ultimately be to expose students to STEM, and to that end, the more people who get to participate, the better. To be honest, it does bug me a little when some folks talk about denying alternates from competing in trial events because of some variation of "our regular team members can get more medals." The point was never for the best team members to hoard the glory and medals; the point was to give as many students as possible the chance to explore science, and trial events don't even affect a team's score.

The other benefit of putting alternates in trial events is that it builds community, experience, and character. Alternates get a chance to take initiative, make mistakes, and find something that they are (or aren't) passionate about. Even if the trial event never gets the stamp of approval to become a regular event, it still helps students to gain expertise in a scientific subfield which might be relevant for some different event. More crucially, when alternates are part of the same community as regular team members, they form friendships with regular team members, and so are more likely to participate in Science Olympiad again the next season. Expanding access to Science Olympiad is more than just an investment in one or two specific trial events, but also an investment in a team's community and identity as well.