I am so sorry that happened to you! (Not the second place, but the test.) I think it is very sad when event supervisors/tournament directors don't take the time to make sure the test is current. People are working so hard, it's just like a slap in the face to have that happen. We had a couple of years where there were a few of those, last year seemed to be better, so we are hopeful for this year.FuzzyLogic wrote:Just went to regionals. After spending hours on my binder they used last year's test! It was about variables and didn't have a single question about the DSO's! We were pretty frustrated.
I'm not sure some of the math questions were even possible. One question gave us the radius of an exoplanet and the distance from its star but not the luminosity of the star. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think that's possible. At this point we just wrote down "well, this problem requires the luminosity of the star to be answered. Unfortunately it was not provided." The next question asked if the planet was habitable. We wrote "perhaps."
But hey,we got second! I think everyone else was just as clueless. The team that won actually didn't study. They just used last year's binder. Probably the only time not studying pays off.
ANDREWWSKI, thank you for your explanation above. I reviewed it with my students, who actually understand the math better than I do at this point, and we all translated it together.
(edited to thank the appropriate person!)
