I know everyone's probably still pumped enough about studying the French Revolution/Chemistry that they aren't thinking about the curriculum for the year afterwards, but why not?

I haven't the foggiest what they'll choose for Social Science (hopefully they're done with regions), but for SQ I'm hoping for another biology-related topic. I know, I know, everyone's totally pro-physical sciences right now, but I'm better with biology. Plus, by that time I will be fresh out of AP Bio.

Discuss theories.

You can guarantee it will be focused on some region outside the traditional notion of "the West". USAD tends to alternate between Western- and non-Western-focused topics; however, Mexico and Latin America was also more or less Western-focused, although Native American cultures are often not considered part of "the West". Anyway, it's definitely time for something more exotic. India? The Middle East? Who knows?

I'm hoping India. It would be hard to specify, though, with such a long period of history. Kind of like China.

The Middle east is way overdue. I suppose USAD could be trying to avoid controversy, but that would go against almost every topic they've had of late (evolutionary biology, china, climate, mexico, probably some other stuff).

But seriously, there is a wealth of art, econ, literature, music, and social science related to the middle east. Why would they keep passing up such a "duh" theme?

Middle East would be good too, or perhaps just Arabic culture in general.

I won't even be competing, but I want super quiz to deal with physics.

India in 2011.

Good lord, if they even tried to talk about religion all hell would break loose.

Middle East and India would be too good. As has been said before about the specifics of the curriculum, USAD never goes for the best of the best, they always go with "meh" stuff. So it'll probably be something about Polynesian islands.

Or Micronesia or Melanesia.

Didn't they already do infectious diseases one year?

last year

I already have my favorite SCUP theme picked out.

Goats on boats......
Well, it's fun to say at least.....

(And I love the new avvie pic btw, but Mt Dew is better )

the balkan wars would be beast.

I'd like communist Russia, but that's a bit unlikely.

I would want russian revolution, but that's too soon after FR.
SO... AFRICA!

That would be awfully hard to keep things straight. What part of Africa?

WESTERN AFRICA!

USAD seems to have a peculiar fascination with two subjects: fratricidal conflicts and facial hair.

2007: China- The Chinese civil war, cultural revolution, purges, and the Tienanmen Square incident saw plenty of conflict but was lacking in quality facial hair.

2008: Civil War- This was basically just facial hair combined with combat in the most violent way possible. General Hooker was basically the only person who was even remotely clean shaven in the entire era.

2009: Yup.

2010: French Revolution- Best remembered as the period in France's history when the guillotine was the neatest thing since sliced bread. I haven't seen the materials but the time period is pretty rich in facial hair, so someone no doubt has a magnificent face pelt.

It will be interesting to see if this trend continues.

Seeing Zapata's glorious mustache makes me want to grow a mustache.

Russia was brought up as a potential topic before. I would really love to see that, although I hope it would focus on pre-communist as well as communist Russia; there's some pretty interesting history of the Russian Empire and I only know a tiny bit of it. However, as I said, you can count on a non-European/Western topic next year, so Russia will have to wait.

Me too.

What are you talking about. You already have a red one.

That's a beak, not a mustache.

Oh. My bad.

I want to see them do The Middle East

WWII would've been my favorite thing to study.

Although I did thoroughly enjoy the SQ topic this year.

Monica with a moustache! Woo hoo!

I'm seeing a trend in the novels. Bless Me, Ultima was rich with sets of three, A Tale of Two Cities has several sets of twos, so my guess for next year is about the oneness of things???? Maybe Siddhartha will be next year's book of choice making me believe the overall theme would be India.

I would feel sooooo bad for people competing then.

Siddartha has already been used by USAD. When I think of a number associated with Siddartha, I think of 8.

So has A Tale of Two Cities.

I think that It would be hilarious if the topic was The Internet, Imagine the interview questions





Probability that "The Internet" will ever be an USAD Topic: about 0% .

It already has been.

I would love to see a social science theme that wasn't history--though I love history. Forever, I've thought sports would be a great theme: you could do probability/stats for the math, mechanical physics for the science, and a collection of articles on the social functions of organized sports--both good and bad--for the social science. Lit would probably be The Natural, though I would hope they could find something more challenging. Econ could have a section on the economic implications of the sports industry. It would be good for a science year because you could have a couple hefty superquiz sections be specifically about the physics of pitching/batting or the physics of running (surely professional articles exist about these things)

Journalism would be a good theme: again, there'd be some history in the social science/SQ, but it could also have sections about freedom of the press, the role of the 4th estate, etc.

Law could be amazing: most people don't know anything about law--not just the historical stuff (though that is interesting) but also the philosophical stuff--civil vs. criminal law, for example, or the ideas of precedent and common law, or the interactions of ordinances, state laws, federal laws, etc. The idea of international law.

"The contemporary world" would also be awesome--not quite current events, but generally stuff about the state of our world, politically, socially, and economically.

My dad went to a week long conference on the Engineering of sports. I think the stuff exists.

Since 2005 it has alternated between historical event and geographical location. Western and non-Western (Latin America aside). I think it likely, as zzzptm said, be India. Only 2 weeks away from knowing for sure. Can we lay some odds?


2:5 India
4:1 Middle East
8:1 Russia
12:1 New Thematic Treatment (Law, sports?)

And the Science Topic?

3:1 Physics (works for Russia or India)
4:1 Human Geography (lots of people in India, population dynamics)
4:1 Nuclear Energy (Halved if topic is w/Middle East or Russia)
7:1 Engineering of some type, not necessarily Physics
10:1 Something disappointing

Where can I place my bets? Heh. I like Russia and something disappointing.

I like Russia as well. A Social Science would most likely be on post-Bolshevik revolution (much like China's S.S. hinged mostly on post-1911). A nuclear energy SQ would be intense. Low scores that year.

Eh I studied nuclear energy both in AP Environmental Science and for debate and although it's not the most straightforward thing ever it's definitely learnable. I think scores would be far less dichotomous than those I've seen on chem this year, where your actual classes you've taken affect your scores greatly. I would love to see nuclear energy as a topic.

Well I'm probably wrong then on that point. But nuclear science in the face of the Cold War would be epically awesome.

Yeah it would be. Honestly nuclear energy is pretty much ideal for AD study: lots of terms to learn, interesting and fairly complex but comprehensible theory behind it, fairly relevant and easy to connect to topic. You could have IRTs on breeders and fusion and whether nuclear power is a sustainable fuel source. It's the kind of topic that would pretty much directly reward extensive study, where students would be roughly on the same level and their scores would reflect their work, learning ability, intelligence, and memory, and not just their life experience (I have a bit of a beef with math, music, and to a lesser extent econ in this regard, even though they mostly helped my scores).

My money's on India and agronomy.

I want Delaware.

USAD needs to do something ultra-obscure, or go super in-depth. The Civil War was good because they took something people knew a fair bit about, and asked questions in extreme detail about expert opinion as well as facts. China was much less common knowledge, but less in depth. Mexico was sort of a fusion (familiar novel and social science, very in-depth super quiz, art and music). All three were good content years.

You know, we might be able to lobby Dan to do this for WSC one year...