Introduction

The forecasting contest counts for 5% of your overall grade, and will be graded on a 0-20 point scale. The goal is to forecast whether it will be raining or drizzling (or even snowing) on Red Square at 10:30 am on the next day. Prof. Bretherton or a designated representative will validate the forecast.  Any drizzle droplets falling from the sky that can be felt on the skin during a five minute period, no matter how light, will count as rain. So will any snowflakes we see landing on Red Square. Forecasts should be made for all weekdays starting Tuesday 2 November and ending Friday 3 December, with the exception of Thanksgiving holiday (Thursday and Friday 25-26 November). Please do make a forecast for Veterans Day (Thursday 11 November). 

The forecasting contest will be graded on a scale of 20 points. Students who submit a minimum of 15 of the 22 possible forecasts will automatically get 10 of the 20 points. The remaining 10 points will be awarded based on the cumulative error points of the forecasts, as discussed in the Scoring section below. Students submitting less than 17 forecasts will receive no credit for the forecast contest. 

Before you begin forecasting, you need to sign up for the competition. When you do this, you will provide your student identification number, a pseudonym (nickname) and a password. This will allow you to enter forecasts anonymously and prevent other people from entering forecasts for you. It also allows everyone to check each other's progress without revealing true identities.

Rules

1. You are forecasting the probability that it will be precipitating (raining, drizzling, or snowing) on Red Square at 10:30 am on the next day.  Forecasts must be entered by 11:30 PM the previous day. The software will not allow you to enter a forecast between 11:30 pm and midnight, so don't be late. The clock on the entry form is used to determine the forecast day. It updates every minute.
2. As your forecast, you will enter a whole number from 0 to 10. 0 mean a zero chance of precipitation, 1 means a 10% chance, 2 means a 20% chance,..., 10 means a 100% chance. 
3. The first forecast will be for Tuesday, 2 November and can be made anytime before 11:30 PM on Monday, 1 November.
4. The last forecast is for Friday, 3 December  (i.e. entered on Thursday). The final results will be posted before the last day of class. Remember that you only need to submit forecasts on Sunday through Thursday evening.
5. You may re-enter your forecast as many times as you like until the 11:30 PM cutoff. Only the last forecast you enter will actually be scored.
6. On days you do not forecast, you will automatically receive a 0 forecast (no probability of rain).
7. Pseudonyms deemed inappropriate will result in the entrant receiving no credit for participation. You are responsible for remembering your own pseudonym and password. If you forget your password, contact your TA and he will remove your password from the file to allow you to enter a new one.

For each forecast, error points are assigned as described below. The objective is to have the lowest overall error point total accumulated over all 22 forecasts. In the beginning, all forecaster's scores appear on a red background. Once forecasters have entered the required minimum number of forecasts (15), their scores appear on a green background.

For each submission, daily error points are accumulated as follows:

1. Daily error is (Actual Precipitation Occurrence - Forecast Probability of Precipitation)² to a maximum of 100 error points.  The 'actual precipitation occurrence' is taken to be 0 if it is not precipitating at Red Square at 10:30 the next day, and 10 otherwise. Note that the difference is squared.

Forecast contest grading (out of 20 possible points)