By Sang Woon Ben Lee, Servite High School, Grade 9
February 21, 2011___On January 29, 2011, 44th Orange County Academic Decathlon took place at Tustin High School. Total of 37 high schools in Orange County participated in this academic competition. A team from each high school had a total of about eight junior and seniors chosen to be representatives for each high school.
The Academic Decathlon was formed in 1968 by Dr. Robert Peterson who was the superintendent of schools in Orange County, California. On December 1968, the first Academic Decathlon was held with 102 students from 20 local schools. Each year, the first place school visited the White House and met with the current United States of America president since President Lyndon B. Johnson.
Each team was asked to write an essay based on the topics given by the judges in one hour. Some students finished early and went back to their team site. One-third of students finished early and the others kept writing until the time was up.
After the essay session, Antonio Carbajal, a sophomore from Team Servite quoted, “The essay topic was so hard even though there were three topics to choose from. I am satisfied with myself that I finished the essay before the time was called.”
Joseph Yi, a junior from Team Servite also quoted, “I still have one more year left to participate, so I will study harder to get a better result next year. I don’t expect to have a good result this year.”
The competition also featured speeches and interviews after the essay. In the speech session, each student delivered a three minute self-written speech to a panel of three judges. After delivering the speech, the judges would choose from a list of topics and have the student prepare and deliver a one minute speech on the chosen topic. After these rounds of speeches, many students were happy to be done.
This competition helps students who are deficient in speech and debate and also gives academic credits useful on college applications. The next competition is on February 6, 2011 at Westminster High School, testing academic subjects and a Super Quiz, where individual scores will be added to these speech/interview scores to round out the total score. The Award Ceremony will be held on February 10, 2011 at Orange Coast College.
