Schools Challenge
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| President or CEO | Robert Grant and Ben Mooney | |||
| Location: | UK, Nationwide | |||
| Status | Active | |||
Schools' Challenge, also known as the UKSC since 2022, is the largest and only active quizbowl competition for secondary schools in the UK. Initially based on (but unaffiliated with) University Challenge and originally established in 1978, it today involves around 250 secondary-level schools.
Format
Match format
The match format of Schools' Challenge borrows heavily from its namesake, albeit with a few key differences. Tossups, or starters as they are known in the UK, are worth 10 points followed by three bonus questions worth a further 10 points each. Bouncebacks are permitted and common. If all three bonus questions are successfully answered, an extra 10 points are awarded to form a tossup-bonus round worth 50 points. In a match, 25 of these 'rounds' are played, before a timed five-minute 'lightning round', different to the previous rounds in that conferring time for bonuses is reduced from 10 to 4 seconds, is played to finish the match. If a match is tied, 'sudden death' tiebreakers are played until a winner is found.
Starters are, however, largely non-pyramidal at intramural and regional levels and there are no powers or points penalties for negs throughout the competition. Although at higher levels, there is now increasingly a degree of pyramidality to starters, as the difficulty of questions increase accordingly, historically buzzer speed has been a key component of success in Schools' Challenge to a degree unlike in other competitions. Bonuses are of the same format as comparable American tournaments and general difficulty also mirrors the American equivalents at regional and national levels. Question sets are written in-house by volunteer question writers unaffiliated with NAQT, the standard at collegiate level in the UK.
Competition format
Schools' Challenge is technically divided into two competitions: Junior Schools' Challenge, open only to those years covered by private preparatory schools in the UK (which in practice means the first two years of middle school) and Senior Schools' Challenge, open to all of secondary school age in the UK (in practice all years covered by middle and high schools in the US) and more prestigious and widely played than the former, which is largely restricted to a smaller circle of mainly private schools. A unique rule for the latter competition is that two students out of the team of four must be in Year 10 (ninth grade) or below, both a nod to historically a portion of rounds being reserved to these younger, 'junior' players and a way to prevent domination of teams by older students.
The Schools' Challenge tournament structure is divided into sixteen regions- Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland all form one region each while England is divided into the remaining thirteen. The borders of these regions vary and the number of teams per region also varies- as a general rule, teams from the North of England make up a slight majority of entrants and there are at least eight teams per region. A one-day regional tournament is played in each region around November/December of each year (some regions play separate matches instead)- in some larger regions such as NW England, it is organised as a round robin before a final between the two highest scoring teams, but generally this is played as a straight knockout tournament in most regions. The 16 regional champions produced from this process then play an inter-regional fixture against the champions of a neighbouring region, with the winner making up one of eight National Finalists. This is the only way to qualify for the National Finals.
The National Finals are the ultimate competition and are hosted in a central location in the UK by one of the finalist schools (Warwick, for example, has been used in recent years) in a one-day tournament. The Nationals also take a knockout form, but every team is guaranteed at least two games: the losers of each quarter-final then play against one another for the National Plate as a consolation prize in a parallel competition, as Plate semi-finalists. From this tournament, the National Champion for the year is then crowned. There is no limit apart from age from appearing more than once.
Equipment
Buzzers are of standard format- many schools use models sourced from the now-defunct Jaser Electronics, but often either Buzzin.live is used (mainly at lower levels) instead. There is also a growing trend of DIY buzzer sets made in-house, as well as limited use of American-made models such as Andersons'.
Successful teams
Schools' Challenge is open to all schools but is dominated by private schools and selective state schools to a lesser extent (notably LRGS won it three times in 2010, 2012 and 2013 as the latter). Non-selective state schools have never achieved meaningful success in the history of the competition. The most successful team in history is the Westminster School, with nine senior championships since 2005. Other successful schools include KES Birmingham with six championships and the Perse School with three (and a record seven junior championships). These teams tend to be ever-presents at the Nationals and qualify almost every year.
Most schools in the competition are either partially or completely single-sex male, reflecting the education system in the UK, and the only all-female team to qualify for the nationals is Bournemouth School for Girls, who won the Plate in 2019.
See also
- University Challenge - the televised university equivalent
- Top of the Form - a similar, now defunct televised edition
- Quizbowl in the United Kingdom