History

The European Volleyball tournament for Statisticians - EVS - was originated, in 1990, in Voorburg, Netherlands, by some statisticians who were enthusiastic about volleyball.

The idea was simple. “All statisticians from all over Europe meet for a comparative volleyball competition”. Besides fun in the game and the work-related comparisons of the profession one essential element of this tournament should be an understanding and tolerance for the different cultures.

The organizers (the Netherlands) of the first tournament established the headquarters of the EVS community (EVS HQ). The unceasing effort and engagement of the EVS-HQ led to a steady growing EVS community in the course of the years. The headquarters remains the central point of the EVS community. It is the point of contact for questions concerning the organization and provides help for the performance of EVS tournaments.

At first eleven representatives of different countries took part in the tournament. In the meantime the number of the participating countries increased to 16 countries and the number of participants increased to 300 persons. During the early years single tournaments were played in the categories Men’s, Women’s and Mixed teams. By now the mixed system with at least two female participants of each team has been accepted. Since 2003 the European Championship has to be played within two groups (A and B) while the participants of the A-Category have been fixed to ten teams. 

In order to continue the legacy of EVS in the best way the EVS HQ-board decided there should also be flexible member-countries representing the EVS HQ. The flexible members represent the organizing country of last year, this year and the next year. This will ensure the continuity of EVS and the organizing countries can share information and give advice to each other. In total EVS HQ has nine members.

As this event has become very popular the rule that only statisticians can take part in this tournament was relaxed within the last years. Meanwhile other participants from different part of the public administration are always welcome.