Undergraduate

Disclaimer: This article is about rules. Its contents are not authoritative. Please consult official rules for up-to-date information.

The Rules of the Game

Rules

Before the game

Affiliation

Eligibility

Division I and Division II

Undergraduate · Graduate student

During the game

Tossups

Powers

Conversions

Negs

Bonuses

Blurting · Changing your answer · Conferring
Description acceptable · Leading articles
Prompts · Recognition

Protests

Hater protest · Moot

Tiebreakers

Undergraduate (UG) is a designation used in collegiate quizbowl to refer to any individual player who has not yet received a B.A. or higher degree from a post-secondary school and additionally has not been eligible for more than about four years. Many collegiate tournaments, including both ICT and ACF Nationals, award separate titles and trophies for teams comprised entirely of undergraduate players (though these tournaments rarely confine such teams to their own division) and may issue separate nationals bids to UG teams.

The time limits on undergrad elimination mean that not all non-undergraduate players are graduate students.

Definitions

In conventional usage an undergraduate is anyone pursuing an associate or bachelor's degree. However, all rulesets currently in use have constraints on the amount of time a player can be "undergraduate eligible", meaning that non-traditional students who do not receive their undergraduate degree in four years may be excluded. Several players have had very long careers as undergrads.

NAQT

According to NAQT's Eligibility Rules, a player is considered an undergraduate if:

• They do not possess a bachelor's degree or higher
• They have not yet completed their fourth distinct year of NAQT competition

Additionally, NAQT rules state that any player who graduates during a competition year is allowed to keep their UG designation through the remainder of that year.

ACF

According to ACF's Eligibility Rules, a player is considered an undergraduate if:

• They have not earned a bachelor's degree or higher prior to the competition year
• They first enrolled in a collegiate program four or fewer years prior to the beginning of the competition year

Notably, this definition counts years in which players are unenrolled or on leave against their eligibility; for instance, a player who completes three years of school before taking a year-long leave of absence would not be eligible for undergraduate classification upon their return.

IQBT

According to the eligibility rules for the 2026 IQBT Undergraduate Championship, a player is considered an undergraduate if:

• They have graduated from high school or have completed a GED
• They have not graduated with a postsecondary degree (excluding associate’s degrees taking fewer than four years to earn) before the competition year
• They have completed no more than ten semesters of post-high school education
• They have taken two classes over the competition year

This ruleset's inclusion of non-traditional students as undergraduates was the subject of significant debate after the 2026 UCT.

Undergraduate Titles

While undergraduate titles have been awarded at ICT since 1998 and ACF Nationals since 2008, many top undergraduate players are excluded from contention due to playing on teams with graduate students. In response to growing calls for a distinct, exclusive undergraduate-only national championship, IQBT began hosting the Undergraduate Championship Tournament in 2023.