Questions & Answers

 

Star Challenge Summer Tourney At-A-Glance

This is an OPT-IN SUMMER PROGRAM for students. This program takes place at home, daycare or other learning places. Students spend time on activities that maintain or improve their health and achievement. The health category is nutrition. Achievement categories include reading, writing, using workbooks or doing school assigned work, playing educational games, creating projects, going on educational outings, visiting safe educational internet sites, or doing STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) activities. An Official Star Point or OSP is earned by participants spending time on the above mentioned health & achievement categories. To earn one OSP, students finishing grades K-1 spend 15 minutes, grades 2-3 spend 20 minutes and grades 4 and up spend 30 minutes. Parents monitor and submit OSPs. Parents with internet access go on-line to report OSPs. For every 10 (ten) OSPs earned, a student will be able to have one slip entered into a drawing. There are five drawings – one every three weeks during the summer and a final one on September 12, 2008. The program’s minimum retail value of prizes is $2,500. This value will increase with entries of additional schools. All winning entries are posted on-line and prizes are sent to schools for distribution in the fall if a participant has registered through a school. All students who participate will receive a certificate.

WHAT IS FREE?

In Summary, the Star Challenge Summer Tourney as described above is free. This includes 5 on-line drawings for valuable prizes, downloadable certificates of accomplishment, graphics showing progress toward goals and many other items that will make this summer a time to build for your child's future success. Shipping of the prizes won by children not affiliated with a participating school will be paid by the receiving party. Shipping costs will include the shipping materials at Edugeeks’ cost. Handling costs will be completely paid for by Edugeeks. The shipping costs will be known and agreed to by the receiving party prior to shipment. Any prizes not awarded due to non-agreement to pay the shipping costs will be given away in the next drawing or the next Tourney. The Tourney entry fee would normally be $19.95 per student with family discounts. We are waiving this fee for the first 2000 students who join at this time.

IS THERE A CATCH?

Our offer is legitimate, but we are going to ask you to agree to the following simple conditions:

1. View a Power Point type of presentation via a downloaded PDF file about Summer Learning Loss enabling you to better understand why Edugeeks has developed the Star Challenge Summer Tourney. (APPROXIMATE TIME-10 minutes)

2. Fill out our short on-line questionnaires, so we can receive input on how to make the Star Challenge Summer Tourney better. (APPROXIMATE TIME-5 minutes each X 4)

3. Talk to school and/or city officials next fall and winter about having their city/school community endorse and participate in the Star Challenge Summer Tourney 2009 if you agree that this program would be a benefit to students.

4. Agree to our Simple Privacy Statement & Rule of Conduct.

IF YOU ANSWERED YES TO THE ABOVE CONDITIONS AND WANT TO FIND OUT MORE PLEASE READ ON

WHY ARE WE MAKING THIS OFFER?

We are excited to introduce our program to many students and communities at this time. We are confident that parents, whose children participate this summer, will talk to school and city leaders resulting in 100s if not 1000s of schools and communities addressing the problem of Summer Learning Loss and poor nutrition by participating in the Star Challenge Summer Tourney in the year 2009.

WHAT IS THE PROBLEM THAT THE STAR CHALLENGE SUMMER TOURNEY IS TRYING TO ADDRESS?

Research from Johns Hopkins University indicates that students' maintenance of school skills declines during summer vacation. Known as Summer Learning Loss or Summer Slide, it is a major detriment to how much our children learn over many years of schooling. During each summer it is estimated that students lose about 1 month in each subject and up to 2.6 months in math computation. Research also indicates that the health of many students has declined. Huge increases in diabetes are predicted in the future.

HOW MUCH TIME IS EXPECTED OF MY CHILD TO GIVE UP OF HIS/HER VACATION FOR THE PROGRAM?

Per Weekday-15 minutes for students going into K-1, 20 minutes for grades 2-3 and 30 minutes for grades 4-8. Winners are given certificates for completing a minimum of 40 sessions. Ex: K-1=40 days@15 minutes or 600 minutes. grades 2-3=40 days@20 minutes or 800 minutes, and grades 4-8=40@30=1200 minutes. Spending this much time maintaining/improving school skills and health will result in earning a Bronze certificate. Doubling the number of days your child spends in the summer to 80 will result in earning a Silver certificate and tripling what is spent earning Bronze will result in a Gold certificate.

WHY WILL THIS PROGRAM BENEFIT MY CHILD?

Research from Johns Hopkins University indicates that students who want to (or whose parents require them to) read recreationally during the summer actually improve their reading skills instead of losing them. Although reading is an important activity to maintain/improve, an additional ten other activities are offered for maintaining/improving health and learning. Our goal is to make these learning and health activities into something which is done for enjoyment and is not considered "work." Doing these activities daily will help bring about good habits which afford the child the opportunity to become more successful.

I'M CONCERNED ABOUT HAVING MY CHILD WORK FOR PRIZES. IS THE STAR CHALLENGE SUMMER TOURNEY A GOOD WAY TO MOTIVATE MY CHILD?

First of all your child is not only working for prizes. Your child will be earning Official Star Points (OSPs) to earn certificates of accomplishment and the eligibility to win prizes. He/she will also see an interface (runner on a track) showing progress toward a goal that will take time. This interface is important as it teaches children that in some cases it can take a significant amount of time to achieve something. Regarding the prize component, Richard Lavoie, lecturer, consultant and author of The Motivation Breakthrough writes "One technique I recommend to teachers is called Get a Chance to Take a Chance. This strategy is a modification of the traditional, "If you do your homework for five days in a row, you can select a prize from the prize closet" approach. This technique rewards a child's positive performance with the opportunity to receive a prize, and is comparable to the lotteries that are sponsored by many state governments. Buying a lottery ticket does not ensure that you will win the payout; it merely ensures that you will have an opportunity to win it. ...... This technique derails the direct connection between positive performance and receiving a prize."

ISN'T HAVING PRIZES FOR HAVING MY CHILD DOING SOMETHING THAT I THINK IS IMPORTANT A FORM OF BRIBERY?

No. Bribery is someone asking your child do something that will benefit another person-usually them. Being able to win a prize for doing something that will benefit your child is a reward which is quite different. The Star Challenge Summer Tourney is a motivation program that will benefit your child greatly.

HOW DO I SIGN MY CHILD UP AND GET STARTED?

If you would like your child/children to partipate, please inform us through an e-mail. We will only use this e-mail address to send you a 1st Use I.D.# and Password to enable your child to participate when the Tourney begins in June. We never sell or spam e-mail accounts. Rest assured that Edugeeks will keep this e-mail address for the sole purpose of making contact with you regarding the Tourney. We will allow up to 2000 children to participate in the program at no cost. We make this determination by the date the e-mail was sent to us. We will contact these individuals a few days before the Tourney which will start on June 10, 2008.

I'M SOLD NOW-CAN I GET MY SCHOOL INTERESTED IN SIGNING UP? HOW MUCH WILL IT COST THEM?

Yes. We would be glad to have your school sign up for as low as $199 for all students that want to OPT-IN. Have your school principal or PTA contact us at 866-EDUGEEK immediately.

PRIVACY POLICY

Edugeeks Privacy Policy is very simple. We will not sell or give away any information we may receive about any person who visits or uses our website. We will not post any students names on our website unless that student mistakenly chooses their name as their "user name" (which we will direct them not to do).

Other important information regarding the privacy policy include the following:

· Edugeeks LLC will not know the names of any children that are registered through their school. We will only know a student's I.D. number and "user name". The schools that participate in the Star Challenge Summer Tourney will know I.D. numbers and student names. Any necessary communication that needs to go to a student will be sent to the school coordinator, who will then make the contact via e-mail or telephone to the student or his/her parents. All awards and prizes will be sent to the school in the fall. All communications will be regarding students’ progress, OSP totals, awards and prizes.

· Edugeeks LLC, will not know the names of any children that are registered through a civic organization.  We will only know a student's I.D. number and "user name." The civic organizations that participate in the Star Challenge Summer Tourney will know I.D. numbers and student names. Any necessary communication that needs to go to a student will be sent to the civic organization coordinator, who will then make the contact via e-mail or telephone to the student or his/her parents. All awards and prizes will be sent to the civic organization in the fall. All communications will be regarding students’ OSP totals, awards and prizes.

· Edugeeks LLC will know the names of children if their parents register them via e-mail as participants. We will make necessary contact regarding OSP totals, awards and prizes with that e-mail address. Of course, a mailing address will have to be given to Edugeeks if prizes are won.

· The operator will use the information it collects on students so that appropriate awards, certificates and rewards can be generated.

·We will never disclose information about a participant or their parents to anyone outside of Edugeeks LLC. No specific information about any individual will be disclosed except by a "user name" or I.D. number.

· We will never disclose information about anyone to another company, organization etc... No specific information about any individual will be disclosed. However we may post information on a website which contains an I.D. number or by a “user name.” For example: User Name: Biker-Winner of a $25 gift certificate, or I.D. # 377854- Winner of a $25 gift certificate.

Unfortunately, no data transmission over the Internet can be guaranteed to be 100% secure. We do not sell or share any information for any reason to any third party. In other words we are are doing everything possible to safeguard the small amount of information that you have shared with us.

If you have further questions about our privacy policy, please e-mail us at summer@edugeeks.com.

 

Rule of Conduct

I will follow OSP guidelines and accurately submit them.