About ACF

Last updated: February 24, 2021

The Academic Competition Federation (ACF) is a non-profit organization dedicated to high-quality collegiate quizbowl. We are entirely student and volunteer run. We pride ourselves on the highest standard of academic questions, so we keep pop culture or semi-academic questions to a minimum.

We offer four tournaments throughout the academic year, roughly corresponding to a four-point difficulty scale:

  • ACF Fall is a novice tournament held in mid-October. It is for players who are new to collegiate quizbowl who do not have significant experience with high-school quizbowl.

  • ACF Winter is a medium-difficulty tournament held in mid-November. It is for both new and experienced players alike.

  • ACF Regionals is a regional championship tournament held in January or February. It serves as a qualifier for ACF Nationals.

  • ACF Nationals is the premier collegiate national championship held in April. To participate in ACF Nationals, teams must qualify by performing well at ACF Regionals, or may apply for wildcard bids.

Who can play in ACF tournaments?

You and your teammates must be:

  • all attending the same school
  • all taking at least one class for credit during the school year.

If you are not sure whether you are eligible, refer to the official ACF eligibility rules or write to ACF’s eligibility committee.

“Mixed” teams containing players from more than one school are not allowed to play ACF tournaments. ACF may make exceptions in very limited circumstances. ACF reserves the right to disallow any team from playing at its tournaments.

ACF tournaments are generally for college teams. In limited circumstances, ACF may arrange opportunities for high school teams to play ACF tournaments.

How to become an ACF member?

People who have done satisfactory work for ACF in the prior year (such as editing an ACF tournament or contributing to the logistics of running ACF tournaments) may be invited to become provisional members of ACF. Invitations happen twice a year: before ACF Regionals, and after ACF Nationals. Provisional members can become full members by doing satisfactory work on another ACF project.

To work with ACF, apply to edit an ACF tournament (applications usually open in the summer), or contact an ACF board member about logistical work.

Donating to ACF

Please see this page for information on donating to ACF.

About this site

This static site is open source. You can contribute at the GitHub repository.