High School FAQ

The MIT High School Invitational is a buzzer-style competition for teams of high school students from across the United States to see who can answer science and math questions the quickest, following the style of the National Science Bowl. As schools from around the country come to the vibrant MIT campus to compete, the High School Invitational provides an exciting experience for Science Bowlers around the country to compete against each other, regardless of their official Regionals performance. The top three teams will receive individual medals and a trophy. The next Invitational will be held on Saturday, November 15, 2025.

Please see our History page to see statistics for past tournaments. While we cannot accept every team due to tournament bracketing and scheduling constraints, as a general rule, we are looking to expand our tournament to accommodate as many interested competitors as possible! This also means that participating teams range from first-time MIT Invitational participants to official Nationals winners, so we work hard to ensure every team has a fair and fun competition experience.

No! We encourage all teams to sign up for our tournaments. However, we do expect that you are familiar with the official Science Bowl rules; practice and preparation are also vital in making Science Bowl competitions a rewarding and enriching experience.

We collect a small fee from teams to fund our tournaments, but teams often cite travel and hotel as the main cost of participating. If cost may be an issue, do not feel discouraged to sign up! While we presume that teams will bear the cost of transportation, we are seeking to offer a travel stipend for those in financial need. 

The High School Invitational features Round Robin and Double Elimination brackets follows the official National Science Bowl rule book. This means a maximum of four students will compete at one time, along with one substitute player. To simulate competition settings at the National tournament, the High School Invitational runs on 10-minute halves.

Round Robin takes place in the morning, and Double Elimination takes place in the afternoon. Teams check in starting at around 8:00am and the tournament final is scheduled to be around 5:00pm.

Questions sets used in the High School Invitational are written over the summer by college student volunteers, most of whom are Science Bowl alumni. MIT Science Bowl board members review and playtest questions before the High School Invitational.  These questions are tuned to be similar to the difficulty level of questions in the Nationals tournament.  You can find our past Invitational question sets on our Resources page.

We have modified the Energy section found in official tournament question sets to focus on current research conducted at MIT. 

There are afternoon activities prepared for those eliminated in Round Robin! In the past, we have set up scrimmage rooms for eliminated schools (from all around the country!) to play against each other, hosted staff-vs.-students rooms for teams to play against MIT Science Bowl board members, and held campus tours to explore MIT's vast historical campus. After these activities, eliminated teams are also invited to spectate the final round of the tournament, live!

Lunch and refreshments will be provided to all competitors!

Teams often travel to MIT by flying to Logan Airport (BOS), taking the Amtrak to Back Bay/South Station, or driving. Boston's Red Line subway and several buses run through MIT campus. For more information, check out web.mit.edu/visitmit/.

On campus, feel free to refer to the official MIT online interactive map (whereis.mit.edu) to navigate the campus.