how to choose the competition team?

[sunje]

Hi guys,

This has probably been asked multiple times...but how does your school choose who competes on the team(s)? Especially in regards to building events? Just want to collect some ideas.

Thanks!

[silverheart7]

We pick our Varsity team based on a few things. Here's a brief list in no particular order.

1. Dedication: If you are extremely loyal and hardworking, you will get a spot over someone who isn't.
2. Experience: A second year (eighth grader) or third year (ninth grader) is more likely to become Varsity than a first year (seventh grader)
3. Past Achievements/Placements: If you have scored well in the past, it will be considered when trying to put together a strong competition team.
4. Sportsmanship, Attitude, Helpfulness: If you are kind, helpful, good at working with a variety of people, and putting the team first, it will be noticed.
5. Events: If you have events that would not be covered otherwise (see Mission Possible or Sounds of Music), you may have a better chance of getting on the team if they are not covered.

That being said, most schools do have try-outs. We don't have a try-out at the beginning of the school year, but our team is constantly changing. If its a matter of three evenly matched people, sometimes we will have a mini event competition to see which two will get it. Mostly, we are selected on those five criteria by our coach.

We do have five teams, so the other four are picked somewhat similarly.

[foreverphysics]

Since our system is comprised of 2 schools for middle school teams, usually we keep the two schools separate. The middle school is usually the time where you try out SO, prove yourself, and gain experience. The junior high is slightly more competitive.

The middle school A team is determined as follows (no particular order):
1. Meeting attendance
2. Test scores
3. Compatibility with others
4. Dedication
5. Seniority
6. Rankings by coach
7. Performance at Regionals

The junior high A team is determined as follows (no particular order, but the first three are really big):
1. Performance during middle school years, sometimes performance at Regs (note: SOMETIMES)
2. Coaching events or not (student coaches)
3. How much you give to the team (resources, ideas, general helpfulness)
4. Rankings by coach
5. Dedication
6. Compatibility
7. Meeting attendance
8. Test scores
9. What competition we're doing (i.e., Invitationals--everyone from both schools are mixed, Regionals--schools are separated, but everyone is spread out over several teams in order to compete in as many events as possible, State & Nats--official A team)


There's not much seniority in the junior high, as there are only two grade levels and there are only 5 ninth graders allowed anyways. But those five spots are pretty competitive.

[astro124]

Arizona doesn't really have any Invitational or Regional Competition (probably because it's a low competitiveness state), so my middle and high schools only send one team to state per year. During my middle school years, the coach went by 8th graders sign-up first, 7th graders sign-up second, and 6th graders take what's left (however an 8th grader could put a 6th grader as their partner if they had the permission of the 6th grader). For high school, my coach doesn't really do a lot of planning so its whoever signs up for that event first (on occasion, she has even told two separate partners that they could have the same event). If there's ever a conflict, she will go with the partner who is more experienced in that area of study. For example, we had a problem with Chem Lab, because two groups both said that the coach told them that they could do the event. She decided to pick the group, who showed to every meeting and the did the practice tests on this site, and had a member in AP Chem.

It's times like these that make me happy that no one else does Astronomy (my favorite event).

[3nv1r0nm3ntal ch3m]

The only 15 kids who signed up go from waterville. If we get that many. That's our key to success.

[thisusernameistaken]

Performance at Regionals and you get dibs if you're an 8th grader

[awesome90220]

Since our system is comprised of 2 schools for middle school teams, usually we keep the two schools separate. The middle school is usually the time where you try out SO, prove yourself, and gain experience. The junior high is slightly more competitive.

The middle school A team is determined as follows (no particular order):
1. Meeting attendance
2. Test scores
3. Compatibility with others
4. Dedication
5. Seniority
6. Rankings by coach
7. Performance at Regionals

The junior high A team is determined as follows (no particular order, but the first three are really big):
1. Performance during middle school years, sometimes performance at Regs (note: SOMETIMES)
2. Coaching events or not (student coaches)
3. How much you give to the team (resources, ideas, general helpfulness)
4. Rankings by coach
5. Dedication
6. Compatibility
7. Meeting attendance
8. Test scores
9. What competition we're doing (i.e., Invitationals--everyone from both schools are mixed, Regionals--schools are separated, but everyone is spread out over several teams in order to compete in as many events as possible, State & Nats--official A team)


There's not much seniority in the junior high, as there are only two grade levels and there are only 5 ninth graders allowed anyways. But those five spots are pretty competitive.

So that's how they do it

[alwaysphonehome]

Has anyone ever had to deal with the 7 seniors rule? Because we have 10 currently that have all been participating for the last few years and how would you choose who participates in varsity and who doesn't? One option would be to do it by skill, but since everyone has different events, that's not really a useful thing to do. As much as I hate to do it, is there a fair way to choose between people that would still be good for competition? Thoughts?

[Jdogg]

Has anyone ever had to deal with the 7 seniors rule? Because we have 10 currently that have all been participating for the last few years and how would you choose who participates in varsity and who doesn't? One option would be to do it by skill, but since everyone has different events, that's not really a useful thing to do. As much as I hate to do it, is there a fair way to choose between people that would still be good for competition? Thoughts?

We had 11 this year :3... It's been pretty rough.. PM me or hmcginny (he's had to deal with it more, being the captain and stuff).
We basically did it based on how bad a event is, if we have underclassmen that although are slightly worse at the event but won't bomb it... then fine. So basically how can you minimize your bad events, so even though you might have the best forensics pair in the country (which I think we might have.. No offense to our Junior who filled in) We had to choose the best 7 seniors that would overall cover the most amount of events that if they we're not there would bomb.

[Luo]

Has anyone ever had to deal with the 7 seniors rule? Because we have 10 currently that have all been participating for the last few years and how would you choose who participates in varsity and who doesn't? One option would be to do it by skill, but since everyone has different events, that's not really a useful thing to do. As much as I hate to do it, is there a fair way to choose between people that would still be good for competition? Thoughts?

We had 11 this year :3... It's been pretty rough.. PM me or hmcginny (he's had to deal with it more, being the captain and stuff).
We basically did it based on how bad a event is, if we have underclassmen that although are slightly worse at the event but won't bomb it... then fine. So basically how can you minimize your bad events, so even though you might have the best forensics pair in the country (which I think we might have.. No offense to our Junior who filled in) We had to choose the best 7 seniors that would overall cover the most amount of events that if they we're not there would bomb.

Yeah, we've been hit hard by the 7 senior limit these past couple years and often times it seems to come down to versatility - even though we might have a senior who we'd expect to do better than an underclassman in an event or two, we choose the underclassman because he/she can be trusted to do several events reliably instead of one or two. It's really difficult to tell those seniors - often longtime, dedicated members - that they didn't make the team.