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CA - SBC Frequently Asked Questions:
Below is a list of many questions and answers related to CA - SBC. Please select a FAQ category for more detail about a specific area. If you have a question and it is not on our list, please email us at sbc@sprott.carleton.ca.
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General FAQ
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01. What is SBC?
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SBC stands for the Sprott Business Competition. This FREE university-sponsored competition allows students to make a variety of senior management decisions for a fictional firm in a fictional industry. In essence, students in teams of up to four members run their own virtual business online while competing against teams from other schools. The object of the game? Make the most money by making the right business decisions!
SBC is completely web based! This allows students to access the competition from anywhere there is an Internet connection. SBC an excellent tool used to enhance course material in business classes as it allows students to see how classroom theory can be applied in a business environment. SBC is open to all high school students in Ontario and Manitoba.
While promoting team spirit and problem solving, SBC provides a fun, safe, and encouraging environment for student learning. It is an excellent addition to any business course!
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02. How can I use SBC in my class?
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The competition can be integrated into the course outline, used as extra development, or for participation marks. It can also be used as an assignment which can relate to class curriculum and activities. For a detailed description of how it can be used to enhance your class, please visit the 'Courses' page in the Information section of the site.
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03. Who is eligible to participate?
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SBC is open to all high school students in Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, Nova Scotia and Manitoba. Students from Ontario high schools compete for cash prizes provided by the Sprott School of Business. Students within new test areas, including Alberta, British Columbia and Nova Scotia, will compete for other prizes provided by the Sprott School of Business. Students from Manitoba high schools compete for prizes provided by the Manitoba Chambers of Commerce. None of the provinces compete against each other.
SBC does allow schools from outside these regions and/or other education establishments to participate in the game. Such teams can play an intraschool competition at the same time as the SBC main competition. However: these schools are not eligible for prizes and therefore will not be invited to participate in the playoffs. Questions or concerns? Please contact Team SBC at (sbc@sprott.carleton.ca).
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04. How do I register?
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Teachers require a validation code in order to register a teacher account with SBC. This registration code is mailed to high schools in January. You can also send SBC an e-mail request for the registration code. Please ensure you use your board e-mail address for this request. This is required in order to ensure that only teachers can register with SBC. You can register for a teacher account any time throughout the year. Once you have an account, you can then log in and register classes and teams for the competition. Classes can only be added if registration is open. For registration dates, please visit Dates & Milestones.
Students: Please note that you must register for SBC through a teacher. They must create a teacher account and then register teams. If you are interested in competing, please contact your teacher and inform them about SBC.
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05. When do students compete?
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The competition begins late February, with a practice competition prior to the start of the official competition. Students enter values from any internet-connected computer twice a week (Tuesdays and Fridays). The final input will occur in late April. The final date of the competition is kept confidential to prevent students from using short-term dumping strategies.
For other key dates, please visit Dates & Milestones.
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06. How do the playoffs work?
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One team from each industry (generally a single class) is invited to advance to the SBC playoffs. There are separate playoffs for each SBC game level (SBC Classic & SBC Xtreme). The playoffs are comprised of qualifying rounds, semi-finals and finals. The structure of these events may vary based on the number of participants. Qualifying and semi-final rounds are comprised of multiple industries (based on the number of teams). Teams advancing to the final round are placed in a single industry.
Teams in the Ottawa area will be invited to participate in a qualifying round on site at the Sprott School of Business, at Carleton University. If your team is outside the Ottawa region and you would like to participate at Carleton, please e-mail Team SBC at sbc@sprott.carleton.ca at least four weeks prior to the event (see Dates & Milestones) in order to reserve a spot. Participating teams will be assigned a computer where they will be able to discuss strategies and make decisions. The game takes place between 9am and noon, with decision inputs every 15 minutes. There is a free BBQ lunch and the winners will be announced in a closing ceremony.
Teams outside the Ottawa area will be invited to participate in the on-line qualifying rounds. Teams will require internet access during that time and will be making entries approximately every 15 minutes. Final standings will be published on the SBC website. Winners in each industry will move on to the semi-finals, which will also take place online. Winners of the semi-finals will be invited to the final round. The on-line qualifying, semi and final rounds all have the same structure in terms of length and start/end times.
For details regarding dates and times, visit Dates & Milestones.
More details regarding the structure of the playoff rounds will be e-mailed to teachers and posted in the news closer to the time.
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07. What do winners receive?
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Team SBC is currently gathering various prizes for this year’s competition. Prizes are donated by sponsors and therefore vary from year to year. SBC Classic and Xtreme Champions and their coaches are awarded with plaques and various other gifts of appreciation from the Sprott School of Business and our partners. In addition, all student finalists and coaches are awarded certificates and other gifts of appreciation.
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08. What happens to the game during March break?
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With over 200 schools competing, we know that many of you have March breaks at different times. To make it fair for everyone and to keep the game going for all our competing schools over their own March breaks, the system is configured to allow students to enter multiple inputs before the break commences. This is the purpose of the "Future Inputs" section of the Team login area. These inputs will then be processed over the holiday, one by one, on the normal processing days (Tues and Fri).
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09. How does the competition relate to the Ontario government curriculum?
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This information is available on the Courses page in the teachers area of the Information section of the website. It outlines how SBC can be integrated into a variety of specific classes and course outlines. Also available in the teachers area, are useful teacher resources, such as sample marking schemes and peer evaluation forms.
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10. How much class time will the competition take?
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The competition can take as much or as little time as you like. SBC can be used as an extra-curricular activity or an in-class assignment. Entering values takes students approximately two minutes. The strategic thinking behind those decisions will take more time. We do recommend that a teacher checks up on the students regularly. Tools for monitoring student participation are readily available in the teacher login area of the SBC website.
The competition can be used extensively in the classroom as a class project with teamwork revolving around related assignments. It can also be used as a component of participation marks. Feel free to visit the teacher Resources page for marking schemes, peer evaluation forms, and other ways to integrate it into your class.
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11. I’m worried the competition may take too much time away from the curriculum!
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You can put as much or as little time into the competition as you wish. Entering values takes approximately two minutes and can be done from any computer with an Internet connection. Many teachers have found the competition to be a complement to the curriculum. One teacher wrote:
'It took my kids actually playing the HSBC simulation, making strategic decisions, reading the financial results, comparing theirs to the industry, to actually make accounting come alive.'
-Participating teacher in HSBC 2003*
*Previously HSBC, the name was changed to the Sprott Business Competition (SBC) in the fall of 2006.
The competition can be integrated into a variety of business-related classes to enhance the curriculum. Feel free to visit our teacher resource area for ways to integrate it into your class.
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12. Is there a limitation on the number of classes or teachers that can enrol per school?
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No, there is no limit. You can enrol as many classes/teachers in the competition as you like. The more the merrier!
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13. What if I registered too many teams originally and need to get rid of some?
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During active competition, teams cannot be removed. Active competition periods run during the practice rounds and the main competition. See the Dates and Milestones page for complete details on these dates.
To remove teams from the competition, contact Team SBC before the practice rounds begin or between the practice rounds and the start of the main competition (last week of February) at sbc@sprott.carleton.ca or 613.520.7565. If you have extra team logins which are not used, their firms will be set with default values and will act as shadow firms. For a description of shadow firms, see Terminology.
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14. What if more or less than four students are interested in the game?
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The maximum number of students allowed is four per team. You can register one team or as many teams as you like. It's perfectly fine with us if you’d like to have a team of less than four students. Bear in mind that experience has taught us that teams of four make it easier for teachers to manage and to encourage team skills.
If you have many students who would like to compete, we would be happy to let all of them participate. There is no limit on the number of participants. Our only rule regarding participation numbers is the maximum of four students per team. Teams of more than four students are not eligible for participation the playoff rounds.
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15. What if I can't book lab time every week/every time students need to make an entry?
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Students can log into SBC from any computer with an Internet connection. This means they can log in from home, a school library, or public library.
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16. What if my students ask me a question that I am unable to answer?
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Team SBC is always happy to lend a helping hand. Any student or teacher who has a particular question can contact Team SBC at sbc@sprott.carleton.ca and we will do our best to respond within 24 hours.
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Game FAQ
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01. How does the competition work?
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Teams of up to four students run their own virtual business online while competing against other businesses. Once students are formed into teams they strategise on how they should run their business. These decisions include looking at their financial statements (cash flow, income statement, retained earnings, and balance sheet) and the industry averages to decide how to price their product and how to allocate their financial resources to earn the most market share and long-term profit. Teams must make decisions in the following areas:
SBC Classic:
1. Selling Price (SP)
2. Investment in Plant and Equipment (P&E)
3. Advertising (AD)
4. Research and Development (R&D)
5. Units Produced (UP)
6. Purchase of Market Research Information (MR)
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SBC Xtreme:
1. Selling Price (SP)
2. Investment in Plant and Equipment (P&E)
3. Advertising (AD)
4. Research and Development (R&D)
5. Units Produced (UP)
6. Purchase of Market Research Information (MR)
7. Sales Support
8. Human Resources |
Please see Basic Rules for more details.
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02. How do students enter values?
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Students can enter values any day of the week, any time of the day. We process firm inputs every Tuesday and Friday for Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia and Nova Scotia and every Friday for Manitoba. This occurs between 4pm and 6pm (in each respective time zone) on those days. As such, teams can enter values and make any changes up until 4pm on a processing day (eg. Tues), at which time the values are recorded at SBC. Beginning at the start of the next business (eg. Wed) day up until 4pm on the next processing day (eg. Fri), students can enter values for the next quarter that is due.
Entering values takes about two minutes on the website. However, we recommend that teams take time to strategise about their decisions before entering them. This would include looking at how they are doing compared to other firms in the industry and analysing their financial statements (cash flows, revenues, expenses) to see what would be the best way to beat the competition and earn the most profit. This information is available on the website during the competition and is updated each quarter.
Every time values are processed (Tuesday and Friday between 4pm and 6pm) a ‘quarter’ passes in the game. Thus two quarters occur each week in Ontario and one per week in Manitoba. Each quarter represents a season of the year (summer, fall, winter, spring) and season affects financial decisions.
For more details regarding terms used, please visit Terminology.
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03. Why does the interest rate on an old loan rise if a firm takes out a new loan?
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The interest rate will rise to the new rate for all previous loans because of the assumption that the firm had to re-negotiate their loans with the bank in order to take out the new loan.
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04. A team that has not made all of its entries is winning, how can this be?
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When a team does not enter values for a quarter (two quarters pass for each game week) default values are entered for them. The defaults values are set by SBC in the system (see Basic Rules for SBC default values), unless a team has ever entered values. In the latter case, the defaults become the last values entered by the team. The default values ensure that if a team cannot enter a value on a given quarter for any reason a default will be provided. After 3 consecutive quarters of missed inputs, the system will no longer use the last values entered by the team as the default. On the third quarter, the SBC default values will be used.
However, a team is disqualified from the semi-finals if it does not enter at least half of the possible entries. In addition, sticking with the default values is a poor strategy as the default is set so as to not allow the firm to make enough profit to compete. A team may appear to be winning in the short term with this strategy; however the system is designed so that long-term use of these values will result in a loss of shareholder equity.
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05. What if all teams in an industry are losing money?
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Just as in the real business environment, entire industries may be losing money. If this happens the team that loses the least money is the winner.
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06. What if two teams are tied?
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If two teams happen to be tied at the end of any competition, evaluations will be done based on participation, the inputs the teams provided, and the rationale (if used by the teacher).
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07. What do I do if I missed an input or my inputs were not submitted correctly? Or what if our team gets 'hacked'?
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CA - SBC is played by many thousands of students each semester. As it unfolds, a competition is unique and cannot be replicated as it is partly the product of the decisions made by each firm in each quarter, based on the results of previous quarters. To 'redo' a quarter with a new set of decisions from your team would require reprocessing the competition from the very beginning. This changes the output for thousands of firms over multiple quarters and renders worthless their careful analyses. This is a considerably more unfair outcome than that experienced by a single team.
Thus, we cannot and will not reprocess a competition due to an error experienced by one firm. CA - SBC has no control over who makes quarterly decisions. We cannot tell the difference between a 'reasonable' decision and one that is claimed to be 'bogus.' To us, a decision is a decision. We leave it up to you to safeguard your password and to ensure the integrity of your submissions.
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System FAQ
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01. How do I register classes and teams?
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When registering your students to play in the Sprott Business Competition, you must first create a teachers login account. After the
account is created, you must then add your classes. Visit the 'Class(es)/Team(s)' page. Once your classes
are registered you must then add teams to classes in order to generate usernames. To do this click on the box with the '+' sign to the right of the
class you have created, enter the desired' number of teams in the text
box, and select 'Add Team(s)'. A list of teams with usernames will
then appear.
Online tutorials are available to assist you with this process on the 'Tutorials' page.
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02. How can I check if my students have all made their entries?
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Teachers can check in their personal login area, accessible by entering a unique user ID and password. Unique IDs and passwords are provided for teachers when a teacher registers for an account on the website. Student team IDs and passwords are provided to teachers when they log in to their account and register a class.
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03. What should I do if a team or I get locked out?
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If a team or teacher gets their password wrong 15 or more times in a row within 2 minutes when trying to login to the game area of the SBC site, their account will be locked. This security feature is in place to prevent people from trying to gain access to others accounts by guessing passwords. In order to have your account unlocked, please send an email to SBC requesting it be unlocked. Teachers: If you have forgotten your password, use the ‘forgot password’ link and have it emailed to you and email an ‘unlock’ request to SBC. Teams: If you have forgotten your password, please contact your teacher for your password and have them send an ‘unlock’ request to SBC. (sbc@sprott.carleton.ca)
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04. What should I do if the website is unavailable or I am experiencing technical difficulties with the site?
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There are times when the system may be unavailable due to weekly system maintenance and backup. Please see the news for dates and times of planned system maintenance. If system outages occur during this time, it will thereby affect the ability of teams to input their decisions. These outages will however be short and teams should still be able to meet processing deadlines. If you experience difficulties with the site, please try again later. If issues persist for an extended period of time, please contact Team SBC (sbc@sprott.carleton.ca) (613.520.7565).
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