As you all know, Battling 101 runs on a pretty tight schedule. Tutees sign up for our tutor/apprentice program and, a lot of the time, they will be skipped round after round due to our limited number of tutors. However, these seminars are here to remedy the problem of limited tutors! Battling 101 seminars aim to have tried and tested tutors work with a group of users during every round, regardless of whether they are currently signed up for the tutor/apprentice program or not. This means that even if you were not picked as a tutee, you can still get some Battling 101 tutoring! Think of these seminars as a public lesson in Battling 101, while getting a tutor during the round would be a private lesson. You, along with other users who decide to join in, would be able to get hands-on experience and tutoring from some of the site's best battlers.
If you are interested in these seminars, you're probably wondering where these seminars are to be held. Luckily, Smogon uses IRC, so you'll easily be able to connect and join in. The channel we use will be #battling101, where anyone is welcome to join. If you're unfamiliar with IRC, you can always follow this Mibbit link. Channel authority will be given to tutors, so you'll be able to recognize them with ease. They'll generally be giving lessons regarding building teams or battling, so you'll even be able to gain some valuable skills by just showing up and watching the chat. Lessons will range from live battling to theorymon sessions, so you will be able to work on a wide range of skills that are necessary for competitive Pokemon, such as long-term thinking, risk vs reward, and prediction.
If you are interested, you'll be glad to note that we're kicking things off quite soon – the first seminar will be held on May 26th at 4:00 PM EDT. We will be covering editing teams, so if you're interested, this is definitely for you. Anyone interested in joining these seminars should show up at that time, tutors included! The Battling 101 staff hopes to see you all there!
Seminar 1:
http://pastebin.com/AhYQGxsn - part 1
http://pastebin.com/VaK0N9pE - part 2