Officials

Game officials are the staff who allow people to play the game of quizbowl.

Mainstream quizbowl officials

Tournament Director

The tournament director (or TD) is the logistical head of the tournament. Though the TD's responsibilities vary with the size of the tournament and number of assistants to whom responsibility can be delegated, some essential TD functions are:

• Ensuring the registration of teams for the tournament, and serving as the main point of communication between participating teams and the host,
• Reserving the rooms in which the tournament is to be held,
• Acquiring enough other staff and equipment to run the tournament,
• Getting the packets of the question set to moderators in proper order, either by making paper copies or by email at a paperless tournament,
• Creating a schedule for the tournament,
• Keeping track of payment,
• Ensuring the keeping of stats, as well as their swift posting after the tournament for all teams who attended,
• Determining protest resolution (or heading the protest resolution committee),
• Awarding prizes and recognizing top scorers.

The tournament director of a tournament often uses a control room, or "War Room," separate from the game rooms as a place for the delivery of scoresheets, keeping of stats, and resolution of protests. (The NAQT HSNCT and NSC are large enough that the TD or TDs set up several control rooms below their own authority to handle different brackets or physical areas of the tournament.) In especially small tournaments, the TD may read for a room of the tournament.

All decisions made by the tournament director are final, except perhaps in cases of multiple physical sites for what is, in some sense, a single tournament (e.g. regional/district/sectional locations of a high school championship series).

Moderator

The moderator is responsible for reading the questions, determining the validity of responses, awarding/deducting points based on those responses, resetting the buzzer system prior to the start of the next tossup/bonus cycle, and resolving any protests that come up (or choosing to send them along to the tournament director). Some of these responsibilities may be delegated to or executed in collaboration with a scorekeeper. The moderator should have good knowledge of the rules used at the tournament and be able to apply them at all times. Sometimes the moderator acts as a scorekeeper as well if no scorekeeper is available.

Protest Committee

The protest committee is a small group or people appointed by the tournament director to oversee protests. The committee is generally named in advance of the first round, and may include the tournament director, moderators, and other workers present whom the tournament director feels would be valuable in determining the outcome of a protest. Generally, these people must have strong command of the format and tournament rules, in addition to having a broad background in subject matter. While it is not normal in state or national caliber tournaments, some local tournaments may include coaches on a protest committee, keeping them out of decisions that could influence their own team.

Scorekeeper

The scorekeeper is responsible for keeping an accurate tally of individual and team points scored for each team. In many tournaments, particularly untimed tournaments with a small number of staffers, moderators who are capable of keeping score for themselves are advised to do so.

Statsperson

The statsperson, or stats guru or statkeeper, is responsible for collecting scoresheets from each individual game, entering them into a quizbowl statistics program such as SQBS, and displaying the results for teams to see. At some tournaments, the TD is also the statsperson; at very small tournaments, the statsperson may also be a moderator or scorekeeper. Large tournaments often have multiple statspeople.

Non-mainstream quizbowl officials

Most quizbowl formats just need a moderator and scorekeeper in every room. Some formats use additional game officials.

Scoreboarder

Often a volunteer during playoff/finals matches of tournaments, the scoreboarder functions as a scorekeeper, writing the score on a blackboard or whiteboard so that the audience can keep track of the score from afar during the match. Fancier modern tournaments such as the HSNCT have experimented with projecting the score digitally. In Illinois high school quizbowl, this function was traditionally performed by a non-playing team member on a whiteboard or blackboard (a board scorer).

Judge

The judge appeared in CBI tournaments. The judge's role is to determine the validity of answers given by the players. The judge also records the points scored on each tossup or bonus in case there is a discrepancy in the score. In mainstream tournaments these jobs are handled by the moderator and scorekeeper, respectively.

Reset/Timer Announcer

Another CBI official whose duties would be performed by the moderator in most other formats, the reset/timer announcer (or RTA) is responsible for starting the clock at the beginning of each half, recognizing the player that buzzed in, and then resetting the buzzer system.

Timer

Some local high school formats require a separate official to be in charge of timing the match.