National Championships
Individual Player National Championship Tournament (IPNCT)
Current: 2021 High School

2021 High School Individual Player National Championship Tournament Logistics Information

The 2021 High School Individual Player National Championship Tournament (HS IPNCT) will be held online on April 11, 2021.

The HS IPNCT is NAQT’s championship tournament for individual high school players. There are also the team-based High School National Championship Tournament on May 29–30 and Small School National Championship Tournament on April 24–25 as well as a Middle School IPNCT on Sunday, April 25.

Registration is now open.

Date

April 11, 2021 (Sunday). This is the same weekend (and, in large part, questions) as NAQT’s 2021 Intercollegiate Championship Tournament, but the HS IPNCT is a completely separate event; no player may play both.

Medium

Online, via Zoom and in accordance with the rest of NAQT’s Online Tournament Guide.

Technical Requirements

Players should read and must follow the rules and procedures in NAQT’s Online Tournament Guide. This includes, but is not limited to, the requirements that players must…

be visible on camera at all times during gameplay
use an Internet connection with at least 2.5 megabits/second bandwidth, both upstream and downstream

Furthermore, we very strongly recommend that players…

use the installed Zoom client application (as opposed to the web app)
read the player portion of the Online Tournament Guide, and potentially the entire guide

In addition to the requirements of the Online Tournament Guide, for this tournament, all players must use headphones, earbuds, or a headset. Using a device’s speakers (whether internal or external) is not permitted. We furthermore strongly suggest that players use a headset or external microphone rather than their device’s built-in microphone.

Schedule

The exact schedule will be determined based on the final field size.

Games will begin no earlier than 9:00 a.m. Central time, and games will be scheduled to end no later than 7:30 p.m. Central time. There will be a lunch break and one or more shorter breaks.

Gameplay Rules

The tournament will use NAQT’s standard rules with the IPNCT modifications and the online play modifications. In brief:

There are only tossups (no bonuses).
Matches are untimed.
There are no notions of teammates or captains.
Some matches (“group matches”) will start with three or more (typically eight to ten) players at once.
In group matches, an interrupt penalty will be assessed for every incorrect answer given before the question is completely read.
In group matches, players may secure a high placement and be removed from the game (“buzz out”) before it is over, depending on their performance.
In group matches, a question only “goes dead” when time expires or every active player has answered incorrectly.
There are no timeouts in group matches, but there will be periodic score checks.

Eligibility

The tournament is open to all players eligible to compete for their school (or homeschool) team according to NAQT’s High School Eligibility Rules.

Qualification

There is no qualification procedure for the High School Individual Player National Championship Tournament. NAQT welcomes all players who want to see how their knowledge stacks up against the very best.

Field

The field is limited to 100 players; these players have registered. NAQT may expand the field depending on the level of interest and the availability of resources.

Format

The final format for each division will depend on the number of players.

The tournament will begin with “group matches” each of which will involve 8–10 players (and 40–70 tossups). All players will play six group matches. The results of the group matches will be used to seed further rounds, the structure of which will depend on the field size and other factors.

The IPNCT format is based on the Hillemann Singles Format pioneered by NAQT Member Emeritus Eric Hillemann in 1997.

Registration and Fees

Registration is now open.

The registration fee is $220 per player.

Registration will definitely close no later than April 4, but the field may fill earlier.

The registration fee only covers participation in the tournament. It does not cover equipment or other expenses.

Cancellation

As of Sunday, March 7, registrations will be considered final. Players who cancel on or after March 8 but before March 22 will still be liable for 50% of the registration fee. Players who cancel on or after March 22 (including no-shows) will be liable for the entire registration fee. Those deadlines notwithstanding, every player will have a one-week grace period from the day on which they register, during which they may cancel with no penalty. Failure to submit the participation release on time may be treated as a cancellation, including incurring a cancellation fee, at NAQT’s discretion.

Payment

Once you have finished registering, click “View Cost.” Follow the page’s instructions to request an invoice (so we have the proper billing information), and you will be offered the opportunity to pay by credit card. If the information is not correct, write to billing@naqt.com with the details.

You can also pay by sending a check, payable to “NAQT,” to

National Academic Quiz Tournaments, LLC
11521 W 69th St
Shawnee, KS 66203–3749

Spots in the field are not guaranteed until payment is received.

Questions

The tournament will use the tossups from the Division II Intercollegiate Championship Tournament question set, plus perhaps additional (newly written) tossups. No bonuses will be used at this tournament. Players unfamiliar with college-level questions may see a sample of a past year’s set.

Participation Releases

Every player’s parent or legal guardian will be required to sign a participation release covering expectations, media coverage, etc. All releases must be submitted to release@naqt.com by Sunday, April 11, 2021. Release forms will be made available via the registration process.

Please be sure that the signer initials the first page in the lower-right corner!

An example participation release is available.

Chaperones

Every player must have a chaperone, subject to the following rules:

The chaperone must be a legal adult.
The chaperone must be reachable by text message (at a number provided to NAQT) throughout the tournament, to the maximum extent possible given availability of cellular networks.
The chaperone must always be able to reach the player essentially immediately, whether physically or by a reliable electronic communication method, during the tournament. In the latter case, all parties involved must take every reasonable step to ensure their reachability.
The chaperone may also be the chaperone for other players at the tournament, thus potentially reducing their regular proximity to the player (but without nullifying any of these requirements).

Players who wish to request a variance from the chaperone policy should write to NAQT at ipnct@naqt.com well in advance of the tournament to discuss their situation.

Awards

All players who have not been eliminated after the end of the first six group rounds will receive plaques. The top players in each subject area (history, literature, etc.) will also receive plaques.

Each plaque will be personalized with the name of the player and have a list of their overall finish and top subject performances. These plaques will be ordered by NAQT following the tournament and shipped to the players who earned them.

Advocate Program

Because NAQT believes that quiz bowl is an activity for everybody, and in which all participants should feel welcome and respected, we have established the Advocate Program to make sure select tournament staff are available to hear reports about problematic behavior and comments by anyone at the tournament.

Please send concerns to advocate@naqt.com, ideally as soon as practical after any incident.

There are other suitable channels for reporting concerns, such as the Misconduct Reporting Form, but the Advocate Program is intended to allow for immediate reporting of sensitive complaints so they can be handled during the tournament.

Reports are confidential to the extent permitted by law and NAQT’s agreements to share critical information with other quiz bowl organizations.

Practice Material

Participants may be interested in purchasing questions from previous years to prepare for the event. All of NAQT’s past regular-season sets are available, as are the sets from previous championships.

Participants may also want to purchase frequency lists, Power Up study guides, and/or Thumbs Up! question anthologies. These are also available on our practice materials page.

Finally, participants may want to look at the information contained in NAQT’s free You Gotta Know articles before the tournament. These detail the most frequently asked-about question topics in a wide variety of areas.

Spectators

Spectators are welcome to attend any and all parts of the tournament. No registration or tickets are required.

Prospective spectators should read NAQT’s advice for spectators of online tournaments. To ensure the quality of the tournament experience for players, spectators may be removed from games if they are disruptive or if the moderator believes that their presence is degrading audio or video quality.

Companion Mobile App

NAQT has created a companion mobile app for attendees. The app includes the tournament schedule (with the ability to set reminders for various events), links to results, connections to social media, and other important documents related to the tournament.

Further Questions

To ask specific questions about the HS IPNCT, write to ipnct@naqt.com.

We look forward to answering any and all questions, no matter how expansive or trivial, in the hopes of eliminating any possible confusion or mistakes in participants’ plans. If something’s not clear, let us know!