Oklahoma Association for Academic Competition

Oklahoma Association for Academic Competition
President or CEO	Gail Bliss
Location:	Oklahoma
Status	Active

The Oklahoma Association for Academic Competition (OAAC) is an academic competition organization founded in Oklahoma in 1991. The organization organizes quizbowl tournaments at several levels, including being one of the two organizations which organizes a state championship for middle school quizbowl. Despite hosting a number of online-test tournaments, and including a significant number of trash or other cute questions in its quizbowl tournaments, OAAC is one of the primary supporters of good quizbowl in the state of Oklahoma.

Tournaments

In addition to hosting a number of online tests for individuals and teams, OAAC hosts quizbowl tournaments in five different classes across Oklahoma: Fourth Grade, Fifth Grade, Upper Elementary, Mid-Level, and Froshmore.

Fourth and Fifth Grade

OAAC organizes two tournaments a year for fourth and fifth graders. These tournaments are held at various group sites across the state, and may be held one per semester or both in the spring.

Upper Elementary

The Upper Elementary division of OAAC tournaments is open to 5th and 6th graders, and progresses from local district tournaments to Area Championships in the spring. After playing a district seeding tournament, all teams advance to regionals, where top-placing teams advance to their respective Area Championship. Teams who fail to qualify for Areas may then play in their region's "Firebird" tournament, a second-chance qualifier where top placing teams again qualify for Areas. Teams eliminated at the "Firebird" tournament may then play at a consolation "Phoenix" tournament in place of the Area championship.

Mid-Level

The Mid-Level division is open to 7th and 8th graders, and is the first level at which OAAC hosts a state championship. The format is identical to that of the Upper Elementary division, including the "Firebird" and "Phoenix" tournaments, with the difference being that top-placing teams at Area Championships advance to the "Challenge of the Champions", OAAC's state championship event.

Froshmore

OAAC's Froshmore division is open to high school freshmen and sophomores. Teams are divided into several districts, with four individual tournaments being held in each district over the course of the season. Each tournament has a unique subject focus (one of math, science, social studies, and humanities/fine arts), with half of the questions in that tournament being in a specific subject area. Teams qualify for the Froshmore state tournament by winning one of the district-level competitions, or, if one team wins each in a given district, by having the highest number of second-place finishes.

Questions and Format

OAAC uses a standard tossup-bonus format across all levels of competition. Each match is divided into four quarters of eight tossups, each with a related single-part bonus. OAAC questions are intended to be pyramidal, and are drawn primarily from textbooks and state standards which are intended to reflect content taught in school at the grade level of the tournament. 80% of questions come from these subject areas, while a further 20% come from "general academic bowl and cultural literacy type questions." Elementary and Middle school questions are generally shorter (often only one or two sentences), while Froshmore questions are longer and feature powers and negs.

Non-Tournament Events

Outside of tournaments, OAAC hosts a number of quizbowl-related events, intended to promote the growth and expansion of good quizbowl in Oklahoma.

Summer Coaches Conference

Each summer, OAAC hosts a Summer Coaches Conference, which serves as an introduction to quizbowl for new high school coaches, as well as organizational meetings and speeches from coaches and event organizers to advertise and coordinate upcoming quizbowl events.

Oklahoma Quizbowl Camp

OAAC sponsors the Oklahoma Quizbowl Camp, a summer camp for high school students to practice and improve at quizbowl. The camp offers classes in a range of subjects, including literature, history, and geography, as well as subject-specific tournaments and an overall players championship. The first Oklahoma Quizbowl camp was held in 2018, and it has been held each year at one of various colleges across Oklahoma (including Redlands Community College and Murray State College). It is directed by Tracey Hickman.