Georgia Science Olympiad: Grades 6

Georgia Science Olympiad: Grades 6 - 12

Program Description and Materials
The grades 6-9 and 9-12 programs, referred to as divisions B and C, respectively, are elements of a national program. Teams in these divisions compete at a regional tournament. The top 20% (approximately) of the teams from each regional tournament are invited to compete at the State Tournament. The top one or two teams from each division are then invited to the National Tournament.

A school may register more than one team for GaSO but only one may progress to the State Tournament. A registration form is down-loadable from this web page. The registration target date to assure a tournment slot in your region is November 5, 2003. Registrations received after that date will have a lower priority and could even be excluded from the competition if space is no longer available. The deadline for registration is December 31, 2003.

Once a team registers, it receives a Coaches Manual that states the rules for the current year's events. There are usually 23 regular events that cover all of the sciences as well as some engineering and communication skills. Events can be either "device" events that require building something prior to or at the tournament, "process skills" events or "knowledge" events in various fields of science. Approximately 25% of the events are changed each year to keep the program fresh. The rules are written to allow for a great deal of creativity in how devices are designed and built as well as how knowledge events are prepared for. There are usually several optional "trial" events offered. Medals and ribbons are awarded for all events but only the regular events count toward team performance (trophies and invitations to the State Tournament).

Through the Science Olympiad national office, teams may purchase additional materials that are specialized to prepare for specific events as well as sample tests. The materials available and ordering information can be found in the Coaches Manual. All new Georgia B and C teams receive a free video to help them understand what to expect at a tournament. The video should also be helpful in recruiting.

A Science Olympiad team consists of up to 15 students. For B division, no more than five students can be from the ninth grade and a school without a ninth grade is allowed to use its graduates who are ninth graders elsewhere. For C division, no more than seven students can be from the twelfth grade. Every event provides for a team of two or more students and a typical tournament schedule has only five time slots so each team member can expect to compete in several different events, often with different teammates.

In Georgia, all regional and state tournaments are held on Saturdays at a college or university campus. Tournaments provide an excellent opportunity to meet students from other schools as well as to meet faculty and generally "scope-out" a college or university that team members might consider attending.

Georgia Science Olympiad Tournament Results
In 2004/05 there were 119 teams registered in the B division and 113 in the C division. There were thirteen sites for regional tournaments with about 18 teams per site. Listed are the top three teams from each of the 2005 regional tournaments as of this date. The results for the 2005 state tournaments as well as how our Georgia teams did at the 2005 National Tournament will be posted as they become available.

Regional and State Tournament Schedule
The tournament sites for the 2004/05 competition are listed here.

Invitational Tournaments
Sometimes schools will host invitational (practice) tournaments. Participation of a team may require the coach of that team to supervise one of the events. When GSO is advised of such invitational tournaments we will post them on this web page.

We have been advised that Bill Wellnitz at wwellnit@aug.edu will host a B division invitational November 20, 2004 (tentative) at Augusta State University.

Booth M.S. in Peachtree City will host a B division invitational on January 22, 2005. If interested in participating at Booth contact Mary Wilde at www.wildescience.homestead.com.

There will be a C Division invitational on November 20, 2004 at Westminster (Atlanta) that is being hosted jointly by Westminster and Paideia. If interested contact Tom Wellnitz at wellnitz.tom@paideiaschool.org. They plan to run all non-device events. Each coach who brings a team will be expected to run an event.

Training
There are many levels of training available for Science Olympiad. The Coaches Manual has information about the four to five day intensive workshops held each summer. They are excellent workshops for novice or experienced coaches and tend to concentrate on the newest events. Michael Kobe runs an excellent 1.5 day workshop near Chicago in early October every year. Michael's 2004 workshop information and registration forms are available here in PDF format.

Within Georgia we rely primarily on one day, no-cost workshops. The most recently scheduled workshops are listed here.

We have also prepared videos that are event specific. The URL's for the currently available videos are noted below. You need to use Internet Explorer as the browser and make sure the pop-up blocker is off.

forestry:
http://wc.gpb.org/vwb/vs_webcasting/viewer/lv?e=142

bridge building:
http://wc.gpb.org/vwb/vs_webcasting/viewer/lv?e=143

storm the castle:
http://wc.gpb.org/vwb/vs_webcasting/viewer/lv?e=147

Emory University in Atlanta will, once again, offer a five day (four night) workshop July 11-15, 2005. The cost is $260 for commuters and $460 for resident attendees and three SDU's will be available to Georgia teachers. Information and a registration form are available at http://userwww.service.emory.edu/~mmccorm/SO/. This workshop was held in 2000 and 2002 and was very highly regarded by the participants. For information contact Mike McCormick at mccorm@emory.edu.

North Carolina Science Olympiad is offering a coaches workshop Friday evening October 22, 2004 through Saturday afternoon October 24, 2004 in Raleigh. For more information contact them at their web address.