Prasanna's post
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- We talked at length about Sudoku Champs as it was conducted this year, to let people know the work that goes into it and encourage volunteers to step up. The work discussed was reaching out to schools, setting dates for contests/workshops, co-ordinating with the schools in registrations, and organizing the events themselves on the set dates.
- We encouraged LMI members from the cities which didn't have strong participation to volunteer, since the cities of Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata appear to have gotten the "higher" participation.
- We already have a person volunteering - Manikodi Rathinam. She said she will co-ordinate with Rakesh and Varun in Chennai this coming year.
- We need to plan with the schools in a better way, preferably negotiating for weekdays and avoiding exams in a better way than we did this year.
- We need to discuss whether we have a workshop first, then contest approach, stick with this year's approach, or some other structure. That we have the workshop base done now, and the fact that we will be sending 6 good (and hopefully trained) solvers to the WJSC, should give us a greater base to work with than we had this past year.

1) I think the most important task here is reaching out to schools and right selection of schools. This year we got one school right and the others wrong (in Chennai). So we will continue with Maharshi Vidya Mandir, Chetpet but not the others. I and Varun have some idea on the list of schools with which we want to work this year.

2) We definitely should be giving participation certificates to all. Maybe we can increase the participation fee nominally.

3) The participating numbers have to increase substantially (threefold at least) if we are to make this event a self-sustained one.

4) We already discussed that the pamphlet at TSC will mention Sudoku Champs. But, in addition, we need to insert an ad in TOI / Hindu / Telegraph and also collaborate with them, if possible. Young World (Hindu) and NIE (Times) have a vast reachout to school students, and it is a MUST for us this year.

Some points on Sudoku Champs from my side.

1. We need to have at least two months fully (eight weekends) for conducting the event. This must not be in the month of December. An ideal time will be October - November, just after Gandhi Jayanthi. If possible, we can start from August, leaving September out due to Quarterly exams.

2. Entry fees must be reduced. This is an event for the school children and Rs.200 is a high amount according to me. This can be done with the help of small advertisements in The Hindu which result in more participation. If Rs.200 is still continuing, then a goodies bag with at least stationery and participation certificates must be given.

3. Ground work in schools can be done. We have the possible list of schools which encourage extra curricular activities and these schools can be targeted from the month of July/August.

4. In cities where there are minimal participation, we can have a centralized event (example the Jagran contests). The winners can be selected from the event.

Me and Amit had discussed something about making workshops mandatory and costing 300, and participation itself being voluntary and free. Just putting it out there to see what others think.

Maybe I don't understand this completely. But this does not sound right to me.

Basically, we have workshops first, then the competition. We approach a school, say we will conduct a workshop, where they can send all students (maybe across multiple sittings), and then the ones interested after that can pursue competition.

Generally, imparting knowledge is valued more than conducting a competition. Hence the suggested cost increase. We can have it for 200 too if the current cost is a bit much. Free Workshop first - then paid competition is also an option.

We discussed this long ago, so maybe I'm missing something too. Will wait for Amit to weigh in.

I second Rakesh here.This somehow just doesn't feel right.If I am a student ,I will be thinking "oh!Wait.Why do I need to pay for a workshop which I have no idea about an amount as high as Rs.300.I am confident about myself ,I would rather attend the competition free of cost directly".But if you were to say that in order to take part in the competition then one would have to have attended the workshop, then that is a totally different thing.But in this case too something feels totally amiss to me.Let me put it this way and a bit more clearly. Somehow I feel that a paid workshop shouldn't be a primary means of attracting a student to a competition .Rather the test itself should serve as the primary way.


Thumbs up to that .It seems to me the ideal way to go about the thing in which case I wouldn't mind paying even Rs.300! for the competition.

We need to finish the fliers for sudoku champs by June end

I still vouch for multiple school rounds in a city and then a City final at a later date as it was last year.

Any chance of reducing the entry fee for the event. I feel 200 is high for a 30 minute prelims with no participation certificates or stationery considering school kids are the participants.

Edited by rvarun 2015-06-25 12:29 AM

The paid workshop is a concept which came out of the Sudoku Champs experience last year, where multiple teachers indicated that students will be very interested in learning how to solve sudoku.

To Kishore's point about being confident about one's ability - there are very few at the U15, U18 level who have had as much exposure as people in our group.
The workshop satisfies one of the most important aims of the event which is to spread the interest in sudoku so that it does not remain a niche event.

Also I agree with Varun's point about 200 being high for a half an hour event. Instead we are providing quality training and possibly some sudoku merchandise within 300 Rs through the workshop.

Do let us know your thoughts so we can finalize the format of the event.

Advantages of workshop.

1. The workshop must be exhaustive considering many variants and may be half a day to full day for the cost attached.
2. Merchandise, Team rounds can be a part of it.
3. It makes a student learn new variants, solving a high level question paper and working as a Team

Disadvantages :

1. The schools in which workshop is conducted will have an upper hand in the prelims considering the schools where workshops are not conducted.
2. The above point is considered because many schools will converge for the event in one school in Chennai and not participants of same school will attend the event held at that school

Some suggestions :

1. Conduct prelims in many schools, at least one in each part of the city with the normal Classic, Diagonal and Odd-Even as it was last year. The main reason for this is to break even than a single event for a city
2. There must be a minimal participation fee, say Rs.100 because a free event may need other restrictions like fixed number of participants per school.
3. Beginner's workshop can be conducted either before the event or after the event. This requires more weekends plus the event requires at least 5-8 weekends. We might need to consider both the factors.
4. Advanced Workshops can be advertised during the prelims with the schools so that it will be a step towards next year's event.
5. Hosting schools need to get some benefit from our side, may be the Sudoku Techniques booklet by Prasanna or a small workshop for 50-70 students
6. We ll try for sponsors at least for stationery and certificates plus gifts for winners.

Edited by rvarun 2015-06-25 11:44 AM

Are there any plans for news articles in dailies regarding WJSC achievement.

Hi Amit. Have we decided the format of the Sudoku Champs for this year.

We are working out the details of a tie up opportunity with Hindu (newspaper).
Will be trying to close this soon. Will keep you all posted.

Thanks Amit. Even if a full fledge tie up is not possible, we can tie up for event advertisement like ad space or coverage.

Can we try for a news article on the WJSC. It will be a good encouragement for the kids.