Ohio 2011

[hmcginny]

does anyone happen to know which instruments were used by the top teams in Sounds of Music?

[chalker]

I've gotta ask, how did Ohio, the best state in the country, manage to screw up out 2 events and start late for the awards ceremony... With the resources available at OSU, surely we could've found more people to grade tests to start the awards ceremony at the scheduled time. Northmont did it, Wright State did as well if I remember right. Heck, West Liberty started early! It's really kinda sad.

And at the state level, especially in Ohio, you'd think we could make sure the event supervisors read the rules and run the competition appropriately. How hard is it to actually run towers? What would have happened if Mentor had been close enough to Solon that had Wind Power and Towers been run correctly and counted(the entire event, in the case of Wind), that they would have went to nationals. I know for sure that they would've been more than a little uspet.

Ohio's the best. We should expect our state tournament, if nothing else, to match our teams' success.

(I wasn't upset with EVERYTHING, by the way. The Anatomy, Disease, Microbe, and TPS tests were all very well written, and the proctors there were helpful. I just think everybody's entire team should've had the ability to experience that)

Having helped run the Ohio State tournament for many years now, I concur that we had a lot of problems this year for some reason. I didn't even mention the countless other arbitrations and issues that came up with regards to other events. It was VERY stressful in headquarters for most of the afternoon.

I don't believe the awards ceremony started late. It was scheduled to start at 6:30 and we sent the first batch of scores over around 6:15. (Note that from 6-6:30 was a planned presentation about OSU). In fact, I have a time-stamped printout in front of me that shows that the B division scores were finalized at 6:27. There was 1 event in C division we were waiting on, but we finalized C division at 7:02PM according to my printout and there was never a pause in the awards ceremony.

As an aside, I also helped run the Wright State invitational and there were far few teams competing. I assume the same for the Northmont and WLS events as well.

Believe it or not, it's actually quite hard to find event supervisors to run events at states. Unlike most invitationals, we generally don't have the coaches run events (there are some exceptions to this), and thus it's often difficult to pull in people to volunteer their time for some strange thing called Science Olympiad. Lynn does a great job finding supervisors and providing us with information and guidance far in advance of the tournament (include copies of the rules and multiple notices to read and note changes from last year), but like the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink. At the end of the day, mistakes and bad things happen - it's a part of every SO tournament since we are all human. This year for some reason it was just a little more severe and visible than in past years.

Will we learn from this? Yes. Will we strive to implement process improvements? Of course. Could we use help next year from people like yourself that are passionate about SO? Absolutely!

[chalker]

Anybody know when they are going to post the results my team didnt stay for the awards

They'll probably go up early next week on the OSU website, but I'll see if I can post them here too somehow later today. Is there a particular event you are interested in knowing about?

[dholdgreve]

What happened in C towers that would kick it to a trial event?

Towers is a walk-in event for both divisions (and run by the same people). On the B schedule we had the event ending at 1:50PM, but on the C schedule we accidentally showed it going until 2:50PM (I take partially responsibility for this since I was one of a handful of people who reviewed the event schedule before it was posted). The event supervisor broke down the equipment at 2PM, dropped the scores off and left. Several teams showed up expecting to compete in the 2-2:50PM time slot and found an empty room. Since we weren't able to allow them to compete, it was only fair to not have the event count towards the team scores.

I just checked (Note we did NOT know this at the tournament yesterday and it did NOT factor into our decision), but if we had kept it as a regular event, the top 6 teams would still be in the the same order, and thus everyone who got a team trophy would have still gotten the same trophy. At least one of the top 10 teams was unable to compete, but even if they had scored 1st in the event they still wouldn't have bumped up enough in the standings to get a trophy.

Wow... that's a shocker... You'd think that it would be assumed that at a State level competition, where teams have worked their bottoms off to be there, that possibly one, maybe even 2 teams, might not compete in an event, but if there are more scores than that that are still blank, the E/C would check with SOMEBODY... ANYBODY! before just breaking his stuff down and leaving! Especially if he has proctored previously... It 's not about whether this changed a TEAM's ranking, it's about all the hard work that the skipped students did, and then could not test... No excuse for this.
... Sorry, just my opinion. Understandable at a competition like WSU... first year, many new E/Cs, intended as a practice competition for Nat's, just and Invitational, but not at State Final that has been run for 26 years... The bugs should be gone.

[chalker]

Understandable at a competition like WSU... first year, many new E/Cs, intended as a practice competition for Nat's, just and Invitational, but not at State Final that has been run for 26 years... The bugs should be gone.

I think you are being too idealistic. There will always be 'bugs' in any large scale endeavor, no more how prepared or practiced you are. Please keep in mind that the majority of the supervisors are volunteers who aren't intimately involved in SO, don't necessarily understand the 'bigger picture' and are generous enough to give up many hours preparing and running an event on a Saturday for this.

I've NEVER seen or heard of a SO tournament or invitational that didn't have 'bugs' pop up (and I've been involved in a lot of them, ranging from invitationals, regionals, states and nationals). However in most cases they are just glossed over or quietly resolved without being brought to the attention of most people (yes even at Nationals every year, where you have the most dedicated people involved and more than enough resources). This is part of the reason why SO has a formal arbitration policy and procedures.

I have a strong belief that overall transparency is a good thing for the program, which is why I'm sharing details that oftentimes at other tournaments wouldn't be announced so publicly. And part of the reason for that is the tendency of many people to play Sunday morning arm-chair quarterback and think that 'these types of things wouldn't happen if I was in charge'.

I know we all are passionate about SO and want it to be the best it possibly can, but there also needs to be a healthy dose of realism and acceptance of human errors. As I've mentioned many times before, we are always looking for volunteers to help out with the tournament and run events. There is contact info on the state website if you'd like to help ensure next year's tournament is the best we can possibly make it.

[soinc9876]

Anybody know when they are going to post the results my team didnt stay for the awards

They'll probably go up early next week on the OSU website, but I'll see if I can post them here too somehow later today. Is there a particular event you are interested in knowing about?

I'd like to know the results for anatomy and Ecology. Thanks

[jarrred_1415]

What happened in C towers that would kick it to a trial event?

Towers is a walk-in event for both divisions (and run by the same people). On the B schedule we had the event ending at 1:50PM, but on the C schedule we accidentally showed it going until 2:50PM (I take partially responsibility for this since I was one of a handful of people who reviewed the event schedule before it was posted). The event supervisor broke down the equipment at 2PM, dropped the scores off and left. Several teams showed up expecting to compete in the 2-2:50PM time slot and found an empty room. Since we weren't able to allow them to compete, it was only fair to not have the event count towards the team scores.

I just checked (Note we did NOT know this at the tournament yesterday and it did NOT factor into our decision), but if we had kept it as a regular event, the top 6 teams would still be in the the same order, and thus everyone who got a team trophy would have still gotten the same trophy. At least one of the top 10 teams was unable to compete, but even if they had scored 1st in the event they still wouldn't have bumped up enough in the standings to get a trophy.

Wow... that's a shocker... You'd think that it would be assumed that at a State level competition, where teams have worked their bottoms off to be there, that possibly one, maybe even 2 teams, might not compete in an event, but if there are more scores than that that are still blank, the E/C would check with SOMEBODY... ANYBODY! before just breaking his stuff down and leaving! Especially if he has proctored previously... It 's not about whether this changed a TEAM's ranking, it's about all the hard work that the skipped students did, and then could not test... No excuse for this.
... Sorry, just my opinion. Understandable at a competition like WSU... first year, many new E/Cs, intended as a practice competition for Nat's, just and Invitational, but not at State Final that has been run for 26 years... The bugs should be gone.

i watched towers for an hour or so, and it was obvious to me and several others that the event proctors didn't know what they were doing and probably got and read the rules the morning of.(all of them were college students) maybe next year it should be suggested that somebody with experience running towers should run it. what does it matter if the person is a coach the his/her team tests a tower i see no real advantage for that team. you could easily get somebody with experience to run a simple event like towers.

[wlsguy]

...Unlike most invitationals, we generally don't have the coaches run events (there are some exceptions to this), and thus it's often difficult to pull in people to volunteer their time for some strange thing called Science Olympiad....

Actually, from my count, 9 or 10 events were run by coaches this year. 7 of those coaches had teams at the event.
Having coaches run events gives their team an advantage (with a known test style, test setup, or material).

Before this year, I had previously been opposed to the practice because I have data that shows those whose coaches run the events tend to win those events.
Now, I'm beginning to thing otherwise.

I would suggest for next year:
Since the events with problems tend to have a building element, assign an experienced school to serve as the "mentor" to the outside party running the event. Many of these schools have been to many invitationals (ours goes to 5 /year) and know how the event has worked in the past. They can also help troubleshoot any problems without actually writing the test or doing the testing.
If you need test setups (which I understand was the case with Wind Power) someone should ask. Many teams have them and would gladly offer them up.

[chalker]

I'd like to know the results for anatomy and Ecology. Thanks

For which team?

[jgrischow1]

Anybody know when they are going to post the results my team didnt stay for the awards

They'll probably go up early next week on the OSU website, but I'll see if I can post them here too somehow later today. Is there a particular event you are interested in knowing about?

We weren't able to stay either. Posting the results would be very much appreciated.