2005 NAQT Northern California Championship

2005 NAQT Northern California Championship

2005 Apr. 16

Stanford University

Current Field:
Evergreen Valley (2 teams, 1 buzzer, early reg.) = $140
San Carlos (1 team, 1 buzzer, early reg.) = $65
San Mateo (1 team, early reg.) = $70
Sacred Heart (2 teams, 1 buzzer, early reg.) = $140
Half Moon Bay (1 team, 1 buzzer)
Acalanes (1 team, 1 buzzer, early reg.) = $65
St. Joseph Notre Dame (1 team, 1 buzzer) = $80
Clayton Valley (1 team, late reg, 1 buzzer) = $90
Bentley (1 team, late reg.) = $95
Mission San Jose (2 teams) = $160

On Saturday, April 16, 2005, the Stanford Quiz Bowl Club will host the NAQT Northern California Championship for high school quiz bowl teams. All high school teams from Northern California are invited. Elite-level teams will vie for the championship and bids to nationals, and weaker teams will have fun and improve their play in matches against teams of similar strength.

The tournament is an NAQT qualifier; the top 15% of the field will qualify for the NAQT 2005 High School National Championship Tournament. Team and individual prizes will be awarded.

Questions
The questions will be "Invitational Series 51" from NAQT. They should be enjoyable for the top teams but should also be suitable for less-experienced teams. Here is a sample packet. Each tossup question starts out hard but gets easier as it goes on. Most tossups should be answerable by the end of the question. Bonuses are more challenging, but your team gets to work together on them.

Eligibility
All teams from Northern California high schools are invited. There is no limit to the number of teams a school can send, and we encourage sending multiple teams instead of sending teams with alternates. Each team must consist of players from the same high school. Only four team members may play at once, but substitutions may be made at half-time or during timeouts. Teams with fewer than four players are fine.

Tournament Format
The tournament will be in untimed "tossup/bonus" format, with 10-question halves. The exact schedule of the tournament depends on how many teams register, but teams should expect to play at least 7 games. We will attempt to match up teams with opponents of similar strength.

Location and Time
The tournament will start at 9:30am and may run as late as 6pm (though we hope and expect to finish earlier). Please be at the tournament by 9:30am sharp; we'll check-in, have a brief rules meeting, and then start play as soon as the rules meeting is over. Teams arriving late risk forfeiting matches. The tournament will be held on the Stanford campus, in Building 260, Pigott Hall, which is at the corner of Lasuen Mall and Escondido Mall. Teams and helpers should check-in at room 001.

Fees
(As per NAQT policy, these fees include a complete copy of the tournament questions for each school.)
$85 for the first team from a non-new(*) school
$75 for each additional team from a non-new(*) school
$50 for each team from a new(*) school
-$5 discount per working buzzer system that you bring (This discount may be limited and must be claimed in email by the regsitration deadline.)
-$15 discount per school for early registration (complete, final info submitted by 11:59PM on April 5, 2005)
-$10 discount per tournament volunteer we actually use (Since we won't know until check-in time whether we need volunteers, these should be people who will accompany your team anyway.)
+$10 penalty per team for late registration (after 11:59PM on April 12). Late registration must be approved by the tournament director.
(*) A new school is one which has not attended a weekend quiz bowl tournament during the '03-'04 or '04-'05 school years. Quiz Kids and weeknight BAAL matches don't count against you.

Registration
All teams must register via email. The deadline to register (or cancel) is 11:59PM on April 12. To register, email the following information to quizbowl-admin@lists.stanford.edu.
1. your school name
2. the number of teams you're bringing
3. whether you are a "new" school (see above)
4. the number of working buzzer systems you plan to bring (these discounts are first-come-first-served)
5. whether you are registering early, on-time, or late
6. a cell-phone number we can use to contact your team on the tournament morning (if you have one)
Please let us know if money problems are keeping your team from attending. Consider registering early to save money and make our planning easier! And please, please don't cancel at the last minute.

Payment
Payment will be due at check-in. You can pay in cash or with a check made out to "Stanford Quiz Bowl Club". Teams who don't pay on the day of the event will be subject to a $20 late payment penalty, unless prior arrangements have been made.

Parking and Directions
Teams should park on or near the "Oval" at the end of Palm Drive. For directions to campus we suggest that you click here and use the "Driving Directions" feature to generate custom directions to the intersection of Palm and Roth, which is near where you should park. Since it's a weekend, parking should be plentiful and free, but be sure to check the signs! (Some parking spots are restricted even on weekends.) Note that Serra Street / Serra Mall is blocked off, so you can't drive down it.

Food
We will *not* be providing food for the teams or coaches. This should help us avoid cleaning charges for the rooms, so players and coaches should bring a lunch or bring lunch money ($10 or less). We recommend teams go to Tresidder Union (burgers, Mexican food, Subway, etc.). Please be sure to be back from lunch at the designated time (we'll announce that time during the round preceding lunch).

Question Security
This tournament will use questions provided by National Academic Quiz Tournaments, LLC. We are using Invitational Series #51 and have purchased geographic exclusivity for Northern California. It is the responsibility of participating teams to make sure that they have not attended (and do not plan to attend) another tournament anywhere in the country that is using the same packet set. Teams can find a complete explanation of geographic exclusivity on NAQT's website at http://www.naqt.com/hs/geographic-exclusivity.html and of their responsibility in maintaining question security at http://www.naqt.com/security-responsibility.html. Teams that don't know which packet sets were used at previous tournaments may find this information at http://www.naqt.com/assigned-packet-sets.jsp. Teams with questions about exclusivity or security should contact NAQT at naqt@naqt.com immediately.

Updates about the tournament, including the registration info we have for each team, will be posted on this webpage.