January 25, 2001

From the desk of the Regional Director

Happy New Year! Congratulations to all the teams who completed registrations by December 15^th. Your timeliness is extremely helpful in preparing for the tournament. If any information was omitted from the registration forms, teams will receive a notice from Tournament Director, Janell Lovelace. If you have not yet registered please do so as soon as possible. Final Registration deadline is Feb 16^th. Registrations MUST be received by that date in order for teams to be scheduled to participate in the Regional Tournament. Forms can be found on the Eastern website.

Patti Adams

Dates and Deadlines

National Registration: Currently underway
Website: www.odysseyofthemind.com

Regional Registration: February 16, 2001
Forms available on the website http://ncom-e.wayfarer.org Forms must be received by Feb 16^th to participate in Regional Tournament.

Eastern Region Board Meeting: February 15, 2001
Nortel-Networks, RTP.

Judges Training: February 10, 2001 Kenan Center,
UNC-CH, Chapel Hill
Snow Date: February 17, 2001

Eastern Region Board Meeting: March 8, 2001
Nortel-Networks, RTP.

Regional Tournament: March 24, 2001
McDougle Elementary and Middle Schools

NCOM State Board Meeting: May 5, 2001
Lenoir Rhyne College, Hickory.

State Tournament: May 6, 2001
Lenoir Rhyne College, Hickory.

World Finals: U of Maryland, June 2-5, 2001

Judges Training

Unfortunately due to unforeseen circumstances Olive Chapel Elementary School will be unable to host the Judges Training. The new location for training will be the Kenan Center at UNC-CH. Each judge will receive a postcard with time, location, and directions. The date for training remains Feb 10, with a snow date of Feb 17. Questions regarding training can be directed to Deb Wolff, 967-1302 or dydwolff@hotmail.com.

Winning
(quoted from a Michigan OM Association’s competition program)

The contest last for moments

Though the training’s taken years

It wasn’t the winning alone that

Was worth the work and the tears

The applause will be forgotten

The prize will be misplaced

But the long hard hours of practice

Will never be a waste

For in trying to win

You build a skill

You learn that winning

Depends on will

You never grow by how much you win

You only grow by how much you put in

So for any new challenge

You’ve just begun

Put forth your best

And you’ve already won.

Scholarship Applicants Needed

NCOM will award three $1000 scholarships to college bound students this year. These scholarships are available to PAST and PRESENT Odyssey of the Mind participants. For application instructions see the NCOM website by going directly to www.ncom.org or linking from the Eastern website. Coaches, your help would be appreciated if you would pass the word along to former Odyssey participants.

Eastern Region Board Meetings

The Eastern Region Board, a group of dedicated volunteers, meets monthly to plan activities and services for the region. Meetings are open to all and your input is desired to assure that the needs of our region’s members are being served. The next meeting will be February 15, 2001 from 7:00 — 9:00 PM at Nortel Networks, RTP. Please contact Amber Hurst 905-3900, ahurst@nortelnetworks.com if you are able to attend.

NCOM T-shirts

The NCOM T-shirts are available for ordering. The sale of these T-shirts helps provide funding for the state and regional tournaments. These shirts make great gifts and souvenirs for teams, supporters, and OotM boosters. Please encourage students to support the state and region as best they can. There is a form that can be downloaded from the Eastern website at http://ncom-e.wayfarer.org. If you are unable to download that form please contact Patti at 933-5595 or wp_adams@mindspring.com.

Back of the Shirt Contest

At the regional tournament there will be a contest for the most creative design applied to the back of the NCOM shirt. Teams or schools may wish to create a unique design to enter in the contest. Designs may be applied using any technique the team wishes…screen printing, iron-on, glue, duct tape etc. The winning design from the Regional tournament will be taken to the State Tournament to compete there.

What happens when?

Judges will receive a postcard or e-mail message regarding training on or before Feb. 1^st.

Volunteers will receive a postcard or e-mail message regarding their volunteer assignment on or before March 10^th.

Coaches and/or coordinators will receive a packet with the tournament schedule, maps, parking permits etc. on or before March 10^th.

Tournament Procedures

North Carolina and the Eastern Region will be following the tournament procedures published in the winter newsletter from Odyssey of the Mind International. Each team should have received a copy of the newsletter from the membership coordinator. In addition the procedures are published on the Eastern website for all teams to refer to. Please be sure team members understand the procedures. Questions can be addressed to Janell Lovelace at jkl-om@wayfarer.org.

Clarifications

When teams have a question about the interpretation or understanding of the problem specifications they may seek clarifications from Odyssey of the Mind International. If the question is a general one, for which the answer would apply to all teams solving that problem, the team may send the question via e-mail. HOWEVER, if the question would in any way disclose the team’s solution either in the question or the answer, the team needs to submit the question via regular mail.

Clarifications for division II and III must be written by team members. Clarifications for Div I may be put in writing by the coach, but the wording must be that of the students. Specific team clarifications will be returned to the teams by mail. General clarifications are posted on the Odyssey of the Mind website at odysseyofthemind.com. The website can be reached directly or through a link on the Eastern website. All teams need to review the general clarifications frequently as they solve their problem.