Jeopardy! Teachers Tournament

The Jeopardy! Teachers Tournament is an annual tournament on the American television game show Jeopardy! It features full-time teachers of students in kindergarten through twelfth grade. The tournament debuted during Season 27 (2010-2011) and has been played every season since (except for Season 37), always during any of the three ratings sweeps periods (November, February, or May), with the exception of being held from May 25th to June 5th 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Format

The Teachers Tournament follows the same 10-game format as the Tournament of Champions, College Championship, and Teen Tournament. The first five games are the quarterfinals, where all fifteen participants play in groups of three. The winners of the five games advance to the semifinals. The players with the four highest scores among non-winners advance as "wild card" players. The nine semifinalists compete in the next three games. Then the three semifinal winners advance to the two-day finals, in which cumulative scores from the two games are added to determine the championship (contestants' scores start at $0 in each game).

Prizes

Cash

The person who wins the tournament receives a $100,000 prize. The first runner up gets $50,000; and the second runner up gets $25,000. Teachers who are eliminated during the semifinals go home with $10,000, and teachers who are eliminated during the quarterfinals go home with $5,000.

Tournament of Champions

In addition to the aforementioned cash prize, the winner also earns an automatic spot in the next Tournament of Champions, although one winner (Larry Martin in 2018) died from pancreatic cancer before reaching that tournament. So far, two Teachers Tournaments winners have made it to the finals of the Tournament of Champions (Colby Burnett in 2013 and Francois Barcomb in 2019); only Burnett won the event. 2016 winner Jason Sterlacci is only other winner to advance to the semi-finals of the Tournament of Champions. Burnett was also invited back to the Battle of the Decades in 2014 where he advanced to the semifinals, and was team captain in the All-Star games in 2019, where he drafted 2017 Tournament of Champions finalist Alan Lin and November 2000 College Champion Pam Mueller as his team members. His team finished as the second runner-up in the event. 2015 winner Jennifer Giles also competed in the All-Star games, as a member of Team Buzzy Cohen. John Pearson was the alternate in the All-Star games.

List of participants

Finalists Semifinalists Quarterfinalists
Season 27 (May 2–13, 2011)
Winner: Charles Temple
1st runner-up: Lori Kissell
2nd runner-up: Larry DeMoss
Kathy Casavant
Dan Crosby
Matt Polazzo
Elisabeth Raab
John Shoe
Charley Tinkham
Grafton Brown
Catherine Carson
Judd Hess
Caitlin Millat
Viki Radden
Sally Umbach
Season 28 (February 15–28, 2012)
Winner: Patrick Quinn
1st runner-up: Brooks Humphreys
2nd runner-up: 1Justin Hofstetter
Leslie Decker
Lisa Johnston
Nate Rice
Mary Ann Stanley
Kathryn Wendling
1Catherine Whitten
John Botti
Brad Brown
Jessica Dell'Era
Steven Evenhouse
Elissa Hoffman
Pian Wong
Season 29 (November 7–20, 2012)
Winner: Colby Burnett
1st runner-up: Michael Farabaugh
2nd runner-up: Kate Wilson
Whitney Collins
Marcia Edmundson
John Hines
Drew Joanides
Brenton Montie
Marion Penning
Tina Baybay-Bykov
Robin Cheney
Francesca Leibowitz
Diana North
Chris Pae
Terry Parker
Season 30 (November 11–22, 2013)
Winner: John Pearson
1st runner-up: Mary Beth Hammerstrom
2nd runner-up: Becky Giardina
Eli Barrieau
Anne Baxter
Patrick Dillon
1Maryanne Lewell
Katie Moriarty
Timothy Shuker-Haines
Cathy Bloedorn
James Brown
Karen Cafaro
Kati Sorenson
1Michael Townes
Rico Vazquez
Season 31 (February 2–13, 2015)
Winner: Jennifer Giles
1st runner-up: Cathy Farrell
2nd runner-up: Adam Elkana-Hale
Mary Bayer
Lydia Cuffman
Eric Hack
Kate La Rivière-Gagner
Erin McLaughlin
Colin O'Grady
Tracy Alexander
Chris Grinvalds
Martha Jackson
Michael Jones
MaryLou McKenna
Jay Singleton
Season 32 (May 2–13, 2016) with its second week at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., presented by Farmers Insurance
Winner: Jason Sterlacci
1st runner-up: Kaberi Chakrabarty
2nd runner-up: Jill Gilbert
Peter Buchholz
Lauren Gilmore
Cory Harris
Bill Knuth
Chris Tempro
Nicole Throckmorton
Greg Greenzweig
Hannah Krug
Dianne Lee
Ian Miller
Tenaya Snider
Terrie Trebilcock
Season 33 (May 8–19, 2017) presented by Farmers Insurance
Winner: David Clemmons
1st runner-up: Nan Cohen
2nd runner-up: 2Mary Parker
Gail Ansheles
Michael Camp
Holly Cannon
Sara Holub
Susannah Nichols
Eduardo Sevilla
George Deane
Lindsey Henry
Dennis McDonald
Stephanie Mitchell
Graham Toben
2Cody Vest
Season 34 (May 7–18, 2018) presented by Farmers Insurance
Winner: Larry Martin
1st runner-up: Claire Bishop
2nd runner-up: Steve Mond
Jake Allen
Erika Eason
Scott Montanaro
Rachel Niegelberg
Katherine Saxby
Judy Tymkiw
Beth Binder
Lee DiGeorge
Indi Ekanayake
Bob Julian
Mary Alice Korth
Ranjani Sheshadri
Season 35 (May 6–17, 2019) presented by Amazon Alexa
Winner: Francois Barcomb
1st runner-up: Conor Quinn
2nd runner-up: Sara DelVillano
Matthew Bunch
Trevor Crowell
Joe Rengstorf
Julia Rosinski Bailey
Dave Rowswell
Benjamin Schwartz
Tara Baxter
Alexandra Bicks
Vicki Leibeck-Owsley
Mariah Minges Klusman
Melissa Okey
Ellie Walsh
Season 36 (May 25-June 5, 2020)
Winner: Ben Henri
1st runner-up: Meggie Kwait
2nd runner-up: Will Satterwhite
Amanda Baltimore
Jenna Hall
Jong Ho Kim
Katie LaBarge
Sam Matson
Lauren Schneider Lipton
Peter Gouveia
Ivory Johnson
Matt Joyal
Anne Pulju
Allison Thomas
Mary Kate Trausch

^1  Catherine Whitten and Justin Hoffstetter in February 2012 are the first pair of contestants to marry each other. Their marriage took place in January 24, 2015. Maryanne Lewell and Michael Townes in 2013 are the second pair of contestants to marry each other. Their marriage took place in Canada in August 2017.

^2  Mary Parker and Cody Vest are the first two teachers contestants that teach in the same school.