MIT Invitational 2016

[Luo]

I'm pleased to announce that the second annual MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament will be held on Saturday, January 23, 2016, on the campus of MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The tournament website is http://scioly.mit.edu/. Registration will open in mid-September.

All of the team-friendly and coach-friendly features of the 2015 tournament will be back in full force. We'll run all 23 Division C national events, including lab and engineering events, with a schedule mirroring the national tournament schedule as closely as possible. All events will be written, reviewed, and run by Science Olympiad alumni currently at MIT, national tournament event supervisors, and/or former national tournament medalists. This means that coaches will not be required to write tests or otherwise volunteer at the invitational, leaving them free to focus solely on coaching their own teams. And, of course, competitors will get a chance to see the beauty and craziness of MIT with campus tours on tournament day.

We are incredibly proud that the inaugural MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament attracted teams from 14 U.S. states, including many of the biggest names from across the country: Troy, Solon, LASA, Seven Lakes, Fayetteville-Manlius, Acton-Boxborough, Bayard Rustin, Columbia, Boca Raton, Archimedean Conservatory, Waynflete, and Chattahoochee, to name a few. We were proud to see that nearly half of the top 20 teams at this year's national tournament had attended the inaugural MIT invitational earlier in the year. But we're equally, if not more, proud to have hosted a bevy of new and up-and-coming teams for whom the MIT invitational was the first invitational they had ever attended, giving them a rare chance to field-test their teamwork and skills in advance of their respective state tournaments. On this note, I would like to emphasize that the MIT invitational is a tournament designed, soup to nuts, for all teams, regardless of past tournament experience or past success. As always, we will strive to make every event challenging yet accessible to all, and we will strive to make the tournament process as easy for coaches who have attended zero tournaments as for coaches who have attended 100.

Early on, the founders of Science Olympiad at MIT decided that the directorship of the MIT tournament would change each year to encourage fresh thinking and ensure the sustainability of the organization. Thus, I'd like to introduce you to Stephen Tang, who will be director of the 2016 invitational. Stephen, a third year chemistry student at MIT, is a wildly successful Science Olympiad alumnus and was an integral member of the planning committee for our inaugural tournament last January. He is an ambitious thinker and a meticulous planner -- precisely the qualities needed for the position. Stephen will be the main point of contact for inquiries sent to the Science Olympiad at MIT main email address, scioly [at] mit [dot] edu, as I transition to an advisory role on the invitational planning committee.

The goal of Science Olympiad at MIT remains to uniquely enrich the Science Olympiad experience of high school students in New England and across the country. To that end, I hope to see you all at the tournament in January.

[Luo]

I'm pleased to announce that registration is now open for the second annual MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament to be held at MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on Saturday, January 23, 2016. After thoroughly reviewing our tournament policies, you may register your school by filling out the online form linked at http://scioly.mit.edu/registration/.

Our registration policy is the same as last year. Teams' places in the tournament are reserved in the order that they submit the online registration form, provided that the registration fee ($120 per team, paid by check) is received by Science Olympiad at MIT no later than November 9, 2015. Teams whose payment is not received by November 9 may lose their place to a team on the waitlist. Please contact us at scioly@mit.edu if the registration fee may pose a hardship to your team or if meeting the payment deadline may pose a problem for your school. We reserve the right to close registration when 50 teams have registered; like last year, it is probable, but not yet certain, that we will end up being able to accept more than 50 teams to participate in the tournament.

As the autumn progresses, please continue to monitor the Science Olympiad at MIT website (http://scioly.mit.edu) for updates regarding the tournament.

The mission of Science Olympiad at MIT remains to uniquely enrich the Science Olympiad experience of high school students in New England and across the country. We are all extraordinarily excited to welcome you to campus for our second annual invitational tournament this coming January. As always, feel free to contact scioly [at] mit [dot] edu with any questions.

P.S. - all event exams and answer keys from the inaugural MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament in 2015 are available on our website at http://scioly.mit.edu/2015-tournament/. I hope these serve as excellent resources as you to prepare for this year's tournaments!

[Luo]

I'm amazed to announce that over 90% of the available spots at the second annual MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament have been filled in the first 24 hours of registration. Sixteen states are represented so far. If you intend to register for the tournament, we recommend doing so very soon. After all confirmed spots are filled, we will start placing teams on the waitlist.

[Unome]

I'm amazed to announce that over 90% of the available spots at the second annual MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament have been filled in the first 24 hours of registration. Sixteen states are represented so far. If you intend to register for the tournament, we recommend doing so very soon. After all confirmed spots are filled, we will start placing teams on the waitlist.

Wow... yesterday I estimated that all spots would be filled in 48 hours, and later backtracked and said five days; looks like my original estimation may turn out to be correct!

[Luo]

Registration for the second annual MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament was closed at 1:00 p.m. ET on Saturday, September 19, 2015. We were absolutely amazed by the deluge of interest we received on the first day of registration, and all spots in the invitational (60+) were filled less than 48 hours after registration opened. We apologize to teams who were unable to complete the registration form in this unexpectedly narrow window of time.

We encourage teams still interested in attending the MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament to secure a spot on the tournament waitlist by filling out the waitlist form at http://scioly.mit.edu/registration/. We will notify teams on the waitlist of their status no later than mid-November. In the meantime, teams on the waitlist should not mail the tournament registration fee.

[Luo]

A tentative event schedule for the MIT invitational has now been posted here. This year, all event conflicts at the MIT invitational will be the same as the event conflicts at the 2016 national tournament, and all teams at the invitational will have the same event conflicts.

A list of participating teams has now been posted here. Teams from 16 states plus DC, including 27 teams from schools that participated in the 2015 national tournament, will be in attendance, along with several teams for which this will be their first-ever invitational!

[Luo]

We're pleased to announce that the keynote speaker at the MIT Science Olympiad Invitational Tournament awards ceremony will be the amazing Pardis Sabeti, a medical geneticist and infectious disease researcher who was named one of the TIME 100 Most Influential People in the World in 2015. She was also a TIME Person of the Year in 2014 and is the lead singer and bass player of the four-piece indie rock band Thousand Days.

[Luo]

We've made a substantial update to the tournament website with a wealth of important information about tournament-day logistics: http://scioly.mit.edu/tournament-day-2016/

[asdfqwerzzz2]

Does anyone have the results?

[Jaol]

Does anyone have the results?

Look through these posts for the general competition. On the 3rd page or so is a dropbox link to the results.