Author Topic: Corpus Christi Trimble  (Read 25887 times)

iakobski

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #150 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:01:43 am »
It's all over for Trimble.

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | University quiz team disqualified

No final year students can be part of a UC team, it's official.

That, I think, is quite hard to enforce. PhD students quite frequently fail to complete their projects, or take unexpected gap years. Their funding can be dependent on annually awarded grants, so if funds dry up part way through their course, they will have a problem.

It would probably be a good idea to restrict it to undergraduates anyway. I suspect most people assume the contestants are undergrads - this is reinforced when they introduce themselves as "reading" a subject. "Reading" means studying, when you do a PhD you move from "studying" to "reasearch".

andygates

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #151 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:04:34 am »
Filming the series across the calendar, rather than academic year seems a bit silly.
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Wowbagger

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #152 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:09:38 am »
That would exclude a lot of students. Trimble was a postgrad. In the 1960s, my brother was made captain of his team because he was the only post-grad in the team.
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Really Ancien

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #153 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:24:12 am »
Being on the BBC gives it a 'quasi official' aura, but it was originally a US show, there's still a credit for 'College Bowl'. It was on ITV for most of its life and is still made by Granada. It holds a special place for Oxbridge Graduates as it allows colleges to field teams of their own.
Allowing Postgrads has meant that someone who is 26 is pitted against the average aged student who is about 20. So it's like pitting those 20 year olds against 14 year olds. it would be much fairer to be setting questions for a much more tightly defined age group with similar life experiences.

Damon.

andygates

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #154 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:32:50 am »
But they've always allowed mature students, there's usually some weirdy beardy reading Geology or Miss Prim reading Azerbaijani Literature.  They're obviously there for the "life-experience" questions.
It takes blood and guts to be this cool but I'm still just a cliché.
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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #155 on: 03 March, 2009, 09:52:31 am »
A few years back, I think a team of pub quiz champions all enrolled at the Open University, with the express intention of winning university challenge. I don't know how they did.

There's now the University Challenge, The Professionals. So it's never too late.

When I was at uni, there was an intercollegiate trivia quiz between the colleges of the University of London.  It was sponsored by K cider and Time Out, and the prize for winning the UCL heat was a crate of K. The union decided to give us the prize the afternoon of the grand final at ULU. So having nothing better to do, we decided to sit in the union and drink the cider, it was 6 bottles each. Effectively the team destroyed itself, we were unable to walk, focus or talk. We still came 3rd though.

Really Ancien

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #156 on: 03 March, 2009, 10:09:25 am »
A few years back, I think a team of pub quiz champions all enrolled at the Open University, with the express intention of winning university challenge. I don't know how they did.


Quote
The show has, since its revival in 1994, featured a number of very high-standard teams with postgraduate and mature students, who might be thought of as having the advantage of a greater breadth of general knowledge.[2] The Open University (OU) won the 1999 series with a team whose age averaged 46. Three of the four team members were former Brain of Britain and Mastermind finalists or otherwise professional quiz show contestants who had joined the OU specifically in order to appear on the show. In the quarter-final they beat a slightly younger team from part-time and mature student specialist Birkbeck, University of London, by only one question.

Host Jeremy Paxman openly criticised the OU team as not being in the spirit of the competition.[3] Paxman also apologised privately for this when challenged.[

Damon.

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #157 on: 03 March, 2009, 11:38:22 am »
The only thing I have to add on this matter is "Toxteth O'Grady, USA".
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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #158 on: 03 March, 2009, 12:45:06 pm »
It's all over for Trimble.

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | University quiz team disqualified

No final year students can be part of a UC team, it's official.

That, I think, is quite hard to enforce. PhD students quite frequently fail to complete their projects, or take unexpected gap years. Their funding can be dependent on annually awarded grants, so if funds dry up part way through their course, they will have a problem.

Really?! I have never seen nor experienced this Wow to be very honest. Never.

Just for the record, I failed to complete my PhD when the company funding me shut down and made me redundant. I'm willing to accept that I am in a very small minority, but it does happen. :)
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clarion

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #159 on: 03 March, 2009, 12:52:43 pm »
I have known a number of people who have been anxious about the continuation of their doctoral studies because of funding being piecemeal.
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Wowbagger

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #160 on: 03 March, 2009, 02:39:38 pm »
It's all over for Trimble.

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | University quiz team disqualified

No final year students can be part of a UC team, it's official.

That, I think, is quite hard to enforce. PhD students quite frequently fail to complete their projects, or take unexpected gap years. Their funding can be dependent on annually awarded grants, so if funds dry up part way through their course, they will have a problem.

Really?! I have never seen nor experienced this Wow to be very honest. Never. So it is not as generalised as you make it. In the current university system it is hard to justify signing someone up for a PhD without funding lined up upfront; unless of course the person is what we call "self funded" maybe (even so if it is rare that they get their award annually, at least in science, engineering or business I would say).

My son has been part-funded (tuition fees paid and guaranteed so for 3 years) but nothing for living / rent. Half-way through his first year, he's applied for further funding for year 2 and beyond. He's been encouraged by staff who have taken the attitude that "where there's a will, there's a way" with PhDs. He's been led to expect some sort of teaching opportunities from his second year onwards, but that's not guaranteed, and I'm his fall-back position if this funding doesn't materialise. So in his case, and, I'm sure, with some of his colleagues, much of it is done on a wing and a prayer.
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bikenerd

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #161 on: 03 March, 2009, 02:42:30 pm »
I'm guaranteed 3 years, with a 6 month extension if need be, funding for tuition, college fees and living allowance, via the NERC research council.  I've done some teaching, but this was optional and I did it purely for CV purposes.

It'd be interesting to have some concrete figures on these matters, rather than just relying on anecdotes and personal experience.

Wowbagger

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #162 on: 03 March, 2009, 10:50:46 pm »
         Previous University Challenge winners appear to break rules |
            Media |
            guardian.co.uk
   


It seems that rule-breaking is endemic in UC.

I don't like this raking over stuff: there is a very simple rule in chess which is applied rigorously and that is if you wish to make a complaint about an opponent's conduct or the play of the game, it has to be made at the time. Once the result has been agreed by both sides and handed to the arbiter, it doesn't get changed.

I think the BBC & Granada should have stood firm. The competition was completed satisfactorily and no one complained at the time. There's a case to say that in future programmes each contestant should have a signed statement from their tutor that they are still at the college, but I'm not sure that Guardian Newspapers have behaved honourably. On Sunday the Observer publishes a piece to say that one team member is ineligible, and on Tuesday the Guardian, which owns the Observer, implies that Corpus Christie have been badly treated because previous Champions have broken the same rule.
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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #163 on: 03 March, 2009, 10:53:58 pm »
Same in fupbal, innit?  Hand of God and all that.
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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #164 on: 03 March, 2009, 11:10:44 pm »
         Previous University Challenge winners appear to break rules |
            Media |
            guardian.co.uk
   


... Guardian, which owns the Observer, implies that Corpus Christi...


[pedant]
The Grauniad and Observer are editorially independent but are both part of the Guardian Media Group which is in turn owned by a charitable body, The Scott Trust
[/pedant]

Wowbagger

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #165 on: 03 March, 2009, 11:16:02 pm »
I think the difference in football is that the referee has to make constant, split-second decisions throughout the game whereas a chess arbiter never has anything to do with the vast majority of games other than record the result. It is up to the players to involve him if they are not satisfied with their opponent's conduct, or there is some point of rules, eg a draw claim by 3-fold repetition of position. I'd say that in an issue such as eligibility, Granada / BBC should have checked and didn't but, having allowed CC to contest the final, that was implicit acceptance that all their players were eligible.

It would be a somewhat different matter if a contestant was told his answer was wrong when he knew full well it was right. Given that the programme isn't live, I suppose he could interrupt Paxman and stand his ground. I seem to remember a Mastermind contestant arguing with Magnus Magnusson over the correctness of his answer. I can't remember the outcome of the dispute.
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Jezza

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #166 on: 03 March, 2009, 11:18:19 pm »
Breaking News: BBC disappears up own fundament.

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #167 on: 04 March, 2009, 12:29:52 am »
Quote
Given that the programme isn't live, I suppose he could interrupt Paxman and stand his ground

Yes. Contestants are strongly encouraged before recordings to do just this  :)

Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #168 on: 04 March, 2009, 08:14:54 am »
It's all over for Trimble.

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | University quiz team disqualified

No final year students can be part of a UC team, it's official.

That, I think, is quite hard to enforce. PhD students quite frequently fail to complete their projects, or take unexpected gap years. Their funding can be dependent on annually awarded grants, so if funds dry up part way through their course, they will have a problem.

Really?! I have never seen nor experienced this Wow to be very honest. Never. So it is not as generalised as you make it. In the current university system it is hard to justify signing someone up for a PhD without funding lined up upfront; unless of course the person is what we call "self funded" maybe (even so if it is rare that they get their award annually, at least in science, engineering or business I would say).

My son has been part-funded (tuition fees paid and guaranteed so for 3 years) but nothing for living / rent. Half-way through his first year, he's applied for further funding for year 2 and beyond. He's been encouraged by staff who have taken the attitude that "where there's a will, there's a way" with PhDs. He's been led to expect some sort of teaching opportunities from his second year onwards, but that's not guaranteed, and I'm his fall-back position if this funding doesn't materialise. So in his case, and, I'm sure, with some of his colleagues, much of it is done on a wing and a prayer.

Sorry Wow but, again, you use an anecdote to generalise. That has no value.
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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #169 on: 11 March, 2009, 01:39:42 pm »
The 'other' end of the spectrum.

London university girls gather for beauty pageant | The Sun |News

I find this funny for so many reasons.

Including the fact that Imperial didn't field a candidate...

Justin(e)

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Re: Corpus Christi Trimble
« Reply #170 on: 11 March, 2009, 06:25:16 pm »
"I wanna be her starter for ten

...

Next to her my brain looks like a thimble

She is smarter than Stephen Fry
and cuter than a thimble

ohhh, Corpus Chrisi Gail Trimble"  ohhhh yeahhh