School System - Tiering

[sjwon3789]

This may have been mentioned already but I couldn't find it in the find function sooo

I don't know if other teams use the tiering system but I'm assuming many schools do this. So for regional teams, my school stacks the teams based on the year before. So top students will be on the top team and the 2nd and 3rd team will be evenly distributed.

Over this season, I noticed some flaw to this system. People get biased if this is done because they don't really wanna make any changes to the regional team for states (each school can only send one team). As a result, some students are not as competitive but they are still chosen for the state team (but there are 3 or so students that are chosen).

I think this is unfair because in the top team, everyone is focused so they can choose to slack off in some events and focus in others (Mainly talking about building events here since I'm a builder). However, this cannot be the case in the lower teams. In other words, I think it's more obvious who is slacking off in the 2nd and 3rd team because the teammates are bad (not exactly saying my teammates are bad but some are terrible in the top team). In contrast, because everyone is doing great in the top team, it is not as obvious -- which is where the bias comes from. The thing about NOT stacking the team also raises an issue -- For states, there will be more rearrangements and some students would be getting new events.

I hear a school nearby using a half stack system -- they choose their two teams before school ends and that's their top 2 teams. When school starts, they open an application process for their 3rd team.

Which system do you guys use and which do you think is the most efficient?

[bernard]

Our organization system changes a bit each year since we're a young team, but this is how we did it this year. We had tryouts at the beginning of the year for returning members only as we didn't expect much from new members. Before the school year started, we had decided some event sets that would require each person to do a specific set of events (i.e. if you had Forensics, you had to also do Chem Lab and Technical Problem Solving). The tryouts were for these sets. Naturally, our top team was all returning members who performed well on tryouts. Then, We took empty spots on our second, third, and fourth teams and gave them to new members. We started with four teams but gradually went down to three because people quit, and event sets made this transition easier because someone on the second team would have the exact same events as someone on the other teams, so if someone on the second team quit, someone on the third team could move up without affect other people's events.

Then, for state, we broke event sets and just assigned people whichever events they wanted because stacking and letting people do events they are good at is more important and it was our last competition of the year (plus if we made nationals, we would have to change event assignments anyway to adhere to the national schedule). People who made it to our top team through tryouts were moved down when they didn't perform well or show commitment. And I think we did a really good job with assigning our teams since at state this year, our top team placed more than ever before and the people we moved up more often than not placed higher than people on the second team (our team allows two teams to advance to state).

[Skink]

I am not at all in favor of the 'don't modify the Regional team' approach. Leave it open for JV members to move up if they 'prove themselves', if you will. Coaches make mistakes and, yes, at times do pick the 'wrong' participants. Students, at times, too, make mistakes and don't get serious until the eleventh hour. It, too, helps to not frame JV--even if they are the lesser performing teams--as less important. Yes, they're not winning bids to advance, but they're part of the team, all the while. Lastly, I, wherever possible, like to employ an 'it's nothing personal' approach wherein, if a Varsity member seriously underperforms at Regionals, then s/he could lose either his or her individual event placement or Varsity status going into State. I'm on record doing this at least once for students who I'm quite fond of otherwise as people, so, at least, I practice what I preach. Humorously enough, this was two years ago, and one of the students is in eighth grade now. She medaled at Regionals this spring in the event that I kicked her from due to bad performance then (tenth?), and she dumped on me a 'You shouldn't have done that.' right there in the winners' circle when I hung her. I didn't expect that one at all. The photographs from it are great, though.

Notice I said 'JV' above. Different states do this differently, and this affects attitudes. In Illinois, JV teams are the norm, and most people probably do see JV as inherently lesser just by the naming alone. In Missouri, they're not. They use a multiple teams per school if bought system but without divisions, and it's up to the coaches to stack them however. Usually, they're tiered. Sometimes, school culture gets in the way. When I met the important people at school down there, they indicated to me that they don't do JV at their school...for anything. I was kind of surprised. Anyway, this pits the teams from the same school against each other. I don't like this system because it empowers the strong programs too much. The top four in Regional events would be consistently us times two and Ladue times two in some combination. This sends a 'You can't do this.' message to everyone else in Saint Louis county competing. They'd be better with JV divisions, then, to actually permit the Varsity teams from lesser performing schools a chance. Anyway, I digress a bit.

[EastStroudsburg13]

I'm not all that experienced with dealing with multiple teams, since my teams never had enough people to do that. However, I did want to note that in PA, only one competition team is allowed for both regionals and states. This avoids the issues of putting teams from the same school against each other, and the larger schools crowding out smaller schools. Multiple teams are still the norm at invites.

In my senior year, we did have a couple extra members, and after regionals, they stuck around, and I think one or two of them ended up replacing people on the competition team by states. So it's a situation that ideally should always be in flux, such that nobody gets complacent. It's the coach's job to make sure that that's the case, though, and any time you have multiple teams, it depends on the coach highly to make the pertinent decisions.

[laneyoung]

We changed our varsity team composition from regionals to state this year and it was excruciating to do. In this case it wasn't because they weren't committed (if that was the case they'd not have been on varsity to begin with). In one case a student was just lapped by another student who had higher raw scores in basically the same events which was a particularly tough call to make. I hope like in Skink's story that they are able to shove it back in my face in the future as I would consider that a happy ending.

[samlan16]

Tiering is always a bad idea, especially when the top team starts getting senioritis. What both my middle and high school do is have all students practice their events without any designation regarding teams, hold tryouts later in the year, and use both work ethic and tryout results to choose the teams. The pros of this system are that the less determined people get weeded out quickly, implying a better overall performance and often an invitation to state, and that students are forced to work harder to earn a spot on the state team, which brings about a sense of accomplishment once done. The cons are that coaches have to train the less determined students alongside the persistent ones for some time, everyone has to carry more responsibility, and a lot of drama ensues when teams are announced (but that can be expected anywhere).

On another note, your team should hold on to a couple of people who do not make the cut as alternates who could fill in on any event in case someone gets sick.

[bernard]

On another note, your team should hold on to a couple of people who do not make the cut as alternates who could fill in on any event in case someone gets sick.

I don't understand missing Science Olympiad competitions for sickness, especially when it isn't severe (maybe a bad cold). I personally wouldn't ever miss a competition for sickness since the whole team is so dependent on each person being there, and if it is an official competition (i.e. regional, state, national), there isn't another one to make up for it.

[samlan16]

On another note, your team should hold on to a couple of people who do not make the cut as alternates who could fill in on any event in case someone gets sick.

I don't understand missing Science Olympiad competitions for sickness, especially when it isn't severe (maybe a bad cold). I personally wouldn't ever miss a competition for sickness since the whole team is so dependent on each person being there, and if it is an official competition (i.e. regional, state, national), there isn't another one to make up for it.

It happens. At my school, people are that lazy.

[Unome]

On another note, your team should hold on to a couple of people who do not make the cut as alternates who could fill in on any event in case someone gets sick.

I don't understand missing Science Olympiad competitions for sickness, especially when it isn't severe (maybe a bad cold). I personally wouldn't ever miss a competition for sickness since the whole team is so dependent on each person being there, and if it is an official competition (i.e. regional, state, national), there isn't another one to make up for it.

I never saw the point either; I was mildly sick at FCS, but I did fine there. It's never actually hindered me in competitions.

[samlan16]

On another note, your team should hold on to a couple of people who do not make the cut as alternates who could fill in on any event in case someone gets sick.

I don't understand missing Science Olympiad competitions for sickness, especially when it isn't severe (maybe a bad cold). I personally wouldn't ever miss a competition for sickness since the whole team is so dependent on each person being there, and if it is an official competition (i.e. regional, state, national), there isn't another one to make up for it.

I never saw the point either; I was mildly sick at FCS, but I did fine there. It's never actually hindered me in competitions.

Yeah, but let's remember that not everyone involved in SO is of national caliber and has that level of discipline when competing. There have been times that I should have not competed due to stomach cramps or whatever, yet I did.