Texas 2010

[walkingstyx]

Yeah, the lack of tests is annoying, but there is a reason they do it that way. I know Beckendorff hasn't been around for that long, so maybe you don't know this, but Texas has a tendency to recycle its tests. The Time test was identical to last year's and that's not the only one. If they released the tests, this would be even more of a problem than it is now, as everyone could just bring in last year's tests and several events would have multiple perfect scores. Yes, it would be better if they wrote a new test for each event every year, but they have trouble finding writers, and if they had to find a new test for every event for every year, then we would end up with situations like the fossils test.

[brobo]

Yeah, I have also noticed that a few of the test at regionals and invitationals can be strangely familiar and similar to those in the test exchange.

So, what exactly happened in Eco and Traj?

[rocketman1555]

Kealing got in the mid 20s in both Trajectory and Ecology. One of their coaches was up there asking about it, as their eco people believe they did significantly better than that (plus they have at every tournament), and the trajectory hit both targets pretty close to the center (less than 20 cm is the impression I got, although I didn't see it). If those two placings were wrong, they could have been as high as 3rd. I'm under the impression that they weren't DQ'd in either. I don't know what they found out. It'd be interesting to see their Ecology test, but they, of course, didn't get it back (why must state do this to us?).

Regardless, good job to Beckendorff (two "f"s, right?) and Riverwood. Those are exceptional scores for both teams. We'll see you guys at Nationals. Likewise, the C division competition was really tough this year, and we all enjoyed it. I heard a lot of new names (TAMS, for one), and everyone was well spirited. CyWoods: like Beckendorff, I think this is your first nationals, and we're looking forward to seeing you there.

That's one thing that frustrates me about Texas. I wish that they would release Regional/State tests to help us prepare for future competitions. If Kealing had gotten their Ecology test back, they would have been able to see what they missed, and see if the proctor graded wrong. I have to commend Kealing, though. I was talking to some Kealing kids in Heldenfels and for having a pretty much brand new team (Correct me if I'm wrong) they did really well at state.

Yeah, it's two f's.

And Mimsie, if I get my team to do Seven Lakes Olympiad next year, we're not going to be aiming for top 5 at state. We're going to aim to win state and make it to Nationals.

I don't know of any state where they release state and regional tests. Can you imagine the problems there would be if a team found a mistake in the grading. If you want to practice based off state tests, you should write down everything you didn't know immediately after you get out of the test. The most they could do would be release copies of the test after, like nationals does for the next year. But as far as I know, there are no regional or state tournaments that release the tests, because it would cause more problems than it is worth.

[Quark]

Texas doesn't give tests back year to year because they don't necessarily rewrite them (a lot don't change at all between years)... I don't think the ecology test actually changed much since last year.

Kealing has 4 9th graders who have been around since they were in 6th grade, plus a few 8th graders who have been there since last year. Since last year, they lost 5 9th graders (now either in C or not doing SciOly) to Lasa and one 8th grader (who is, I believe, one of the people who did eco last year for them) to St. Andrews. But the majority are in their first or second year of SciO. I'm not quite sure of the 6th/7th/8th grader breakdown. Kealing also lost a really good coach to St. Andrews (he is an amazing person). He basically coached most of the stuff related to physics, chemistry, or engineering, and stayed after school at least 3 times a week. So you have about the right idea of the situation.

No matter what happened/didn't happen to cause Kealing's placing in those two events, it fortunately couldn't have made a difference in who goes to Nationals.

[starpug]

Kealing got in the mid 20s in both Trajectory and Ecology. One of their coaches was up there asking about it, as their eco people believe they did significantly better than that (plus they have at every tournament), and the trajectory hit both targets pretty close to the center (less than 20 cm is the impression I got, although I didn't see it). If those two placings were wrong, they could have been as high as 3rd. I'm under the impression that they weren't DQ'd in either. I don't know what they found out. It'd be interesting to see their Ecology test, but they, of course, didn't get it back (why must state do this to us?).

Regardless, good job to Beckendorff (two "f"s, right?) and Riverwood. Those are exceptional scores for both teams. We'll see you guys at Nationals. Likewise, the C division competition was really tough this year, and we all enjoyed it. I heard a lot of new names (TAMS, for one), and everyone was well spirited. CyWoods: like Beckendorff, I think this is your first nationals, and we're looking forward to seeing you there.

That's one thing that frustrates me about Texas. I wish that they would release Regional/State tests to help us prepare for future competitions. If Kealing had gotten their Ecology test back, they would have been able to see what they missed, and see if the proctor graded wrong. I have to commend Kealing, though. I was talking to some Kealing kids in Heldenfels and for having a pretty much brand new team (Correct me if I'm wrong) they did really well at state.

Yeah, it's two f's.

And Mimsie, if I get my team to do Seven Lakes Olympiad next year, we're not going to be aiming for top 5 at state. We're going to aim to win state and make it to Nationals.

I don't know of any state where they release state and regional tests. Can you imagine the problems there would be if a team found a mistake in the grading. If you want to practice based off state tests, you should write down everything you didn't know immediately after you get out of the test. The most they could do would be release copies of the test after, like nationals does for the next year. But as far as I know, there are no regional or state tournaments that release the tests, because it would cause more problems than it is worth.

In my experiance in NorCal and Maine, test writers have had the choice of wheather or not to release the tests after the competition.

[fmtiger124]

I know in NY, we got sent our regional test's to look at and see our mistakes but I think we might have had to send them back, my coach was always very protective and basically wanted to know where they were at all times.

[cypressfalls Robert]

there's no point in sending them back when there are photocopiers

[texan92]

The UT Austin regional gives back the tests to their teams. Heck, they even mailed us our Physics Lab test back to us because it wasn't originally included in the massive folder of tests they gave us after awards. That was a good study resource.

On a different note, did anyone think that the written part of Physics Lab at states was hard? It had Calc III and partial derivatives on it . We left like half the test blank or BSed the answers for whatever we did answer but still ended up placing 2nd

[RndmPplPrsn]

Kealing got in the mid 20s in both Trajectory and Ecology. One of their coaches was up there asking about it, as their eco people believe they did significantly better than that (plus they have at every tournament), and the trajectory hit both targets pretty close to the center (less than 20 cm is the impression I got, although I didn't see it). If those two placings were wrong, they could have been as high as 3rd. I'm under the impression that they weren't DQ'd in either. I don't know what they found out. It'd be interesting to see their Ecology test, but they, of course, didn't get it back (why must state do this to us?).

Regardless, good job to Beckendorff (two "f"s, right?) and Riverwood. Those are exceptional scores for both teams. We'll see you guys at Nationals. Likewise, the C division competition was really tough this year, and we all enjoyed it. I heard a lot of new names (TAMS, for one), and everyone was well spirited. CyWoods: like Beckendorff, I think this is your first nationals, and we're looking forward to seeing you there.

Yeah we have been doing pretty well at Eco as well, and were dropped with a 26. Our people were like, ???, we thought we did VERY well. I think there might have been some Scantron issues. TAMS is a VERY good testing team, they are part of the UNT system, and they are an academy. Our regional must have been really weird or people were holding stuff back. Greenhill and TAMS were there, and we did waaaaaay worse in some events, that we beat them in at Regionals. Not to mention the overall placing difference. If TAMS can get its act together on the building events, they have a really good chance at shaking things up. That was the only reason they did not to State last year, they didn't compete at all in 3 building events, and 1 testing event, and still got 4th.

[RndmPplPrsn]

Also can anyone post the link to the 5-year event prediction sheet, I cannot find it.