Illinois 2013

[XJcwolfyX]

I think they say that, but I'm pretty sure they just take the top half teams at State from the previous year and put them in Division AA.

[scarothjagaroth]

If anybody is interested, full state results are here (since I know coaches don't always make them available to teams):

http://avogadro.ws/hosted/il-state-c/public/results (C division)
http://avogadro.ws/hosted/il-state-b/public/results (B division)

[Skink]

What's the results? How did it go?

avogadro.ws And I can confirm that raw scores are available for own teams.

So... That was pretty painful for our team. But congrats on your medals, mrsteven - that must have been a pretty nice note on which to end your Scioly career.

It was nice to meet you, Cheesy and wolfy. I'm going to assume Skink was just lurking mysteriously again.

The other school was on fire! Where did that come from?

Woah woah woah! I'm the only one who wasn't fashionably late for the Gravity Vehicle meet-up . Dunno how behind they were, but I left a couple minutes after you arrived for cleaning up our home base and dealing with a bad supervisor. I even missed my team's run for an event at 3:20 as a result. Oh, well.

Hi, I'm new to the forums, and I'm just wondering how a team moves up to AA. I kinda took it for granted during middle school, and I'd really like my school to become competitive (again, that is) while I'm still there.

Hi there. It's easier to give advice with more information...
mrsteven's wrong re: how they determine A/AA (or, at least, seems to be). That's fine considering I didn't know, either, until probing myself. They don't look at the individual school, the location, the support the program gets, the ages of competitors, or anything like that. They use a mathematical formula to determine A/AA with a few criteria, most notably recent results and the regional's competitiveness. If you load the A/AA document, you'll see that the competitiveness of the Regional is the primary determining factor in A/AA. This IS, in fact, a location thing. The greater Chicago area teams tend to be better, so CPS, western and southern IL teams are all A. Regionals in the suburbs have either all AA or mostly AA. I don't know how much weight they put on each individual factor; all I know is they don't make any judgment calls after the formula is agreed upon. Do they use the same one every year? Dunno.

I think they say that, but I'm pretty sure they just take the top half teams at State from the previous year and put them in Division AA.

In theory, that's what they want to accomplish, anyway. If a AA team loses to several A teams, the assignments were a partial failure, in my opinion. It's an imperfect process, but I'll spare talking your ear off. ANd don't get the wrong idea...dark horses always rise up and surprise everyone in A. I'll bet Libertyville in 2011 had a nice overall rank.

[Knighted_Cardinal]

Sorry, I wasn't thinking. I'm from Prospect, middle school was South.

[mrsteven]

Oh... My bad. I was going off information my coach gave- my bad.

Other school on fire..?

[Skink]

Oh... My bad. I was going off information my coach gave- my bad.

Other school on fire..?

And maybe it changed and that WAS how it was, who knows? What I know is circa last week, so it's good . I did a little paraphrasing, but..

THe other Naperville school was really good.

Sorry, I wasn't thinking. I'm from Prospect, middle school was South.

Oh, yeah. I remember the old head coach. He was kinda a mean supervisor once Anyway...
Prospect WAS good back in the day. South kinda took a nosedive recently themselves compared to where they were some years ago. They're lucky S&A didn't top them at State. Anyways, getting a good C team is a daunting task in today's competitive environment. It almost requires the feeder school team to be great, which is a nonissue. I guess I don't see why the fervor drops off in high school if the middle school team was THAT good. Anyway, you can build a competitive team in two years, and you guys are already a State-going team to start with. Libertyville did it. They're caught in the middle of the top now, but, hey, join the crowd. I guess the question is HOW competitive do you really want to get?

[Cheesy Pie]

Yesterday, I met chia, kjhsscioly, and mrsteven. I cheered when they got medals, and then my team thought I was insane.
And, for everyone else's info, I am NOT Asian (they all thought I was).

[mrsteven]

Hey hey hey, that was just wolfy
I hadnt actually thought about it haha

[Knighted_Cardinal]

I've only been on the Prospect team for part of the year(I joined about 2 weeks before regionals) but South had a lot of parent and community volunteers to help coach, and at Prospect most of our math and science department either don't care or coach a sport... And as for how competitive I want the team to be, it's not so much for winning state(even though that would be nice) as it is just knowing that the medals you win mean that you topped the whole state, and not just the division A schools. You know?

[mrsteven]

As the captain of buffalo grove, i know what you mean. Its extremely hard to get people on the team involved enough to do well and Ive learned that if they dont have the desire to study or do well, then nothing you do is going to make them. Especially if your team (like mine and most) isnt big enough to be terribly selective for varsity.

Focus on yourself and the people that do care. If you medal in A there still is a chance you are actually still top 5 overall in the whole scheme. I remember last year some A div team actually had 3rd for helicopters.
And to medal in AA requires alot of work. Basically from 7-12 everyday im either working on school or scioly. The month before regionals and before state im working until maybe 3am. You really do need to pour yourself into it so it has to be something you enjoy doing. I dont even think about competitions until a week or two before. Before then, im building stuff and thinking and applying principles and I really enjoy making something complex functional. Its not until i need to go to a competition that i even think about winning/all that. Its more about the journey there. Personally, i dont like compeititions, i really like building and designing.
So it comes at a great surprise to me when people use blankets to cover their devices or get angry at pictures being taken. SO should be about learning, not blind competition. And in IL its really just become that. Ive never been secretive about my stuff, its interesting and i think its the point of scioly to learn how other people think and how to come up with ideas

Edit- kinda went off topic there lol sorry