Stepping Stone Theory

The Stepping Stone Theory states that holding collegiate tournaments on high school questions will allow new players to acclimate to collegiate quizbowl on easier material, and thus act as "stepping stones" to participation in more mainstream events.

There are zero known examples of the stepping stone theory actually working. Teams who play high school questions tend to play high school questions forever, and collegiate players who play high school questions tend to drop out of quizbowl when the opportunity to play high school questions ends.

Why explicitly collegiate novice questions are not equally able to fill the "stepping stone" role has never adequately been explained, but it may have to do with the fact that NAQT does not collect any money when non-NAQT novice tournaments are held.