BHS Competes at Academic Olympics
 | Author:
Mikayla Kraft, School Correspondent
MT43 News School Correspondent |
BHS Competes at Academic Olympics
Harvard/MIT Mathematics Tournament, U.S. National Chemistry Olympiad, B.E.S.T Robotics competition, and the Congressional App Challenge are just a few examples of high school competition programs offered across the United States. Unfortunately, most competitions such as these are strictly focused on one branch of academics such as chemistry, accounting, or computer science.
Montana gets an interesting and unique academic competition conducted here and in other states. Not only do high school students get the opportunity to be involved in a competition with one generalized topic, but they can have the opportunity to be involved in a competition that focuses on academics across the board.
Once a year, students from across the state gather together to show off the best of their academic abilities. We put together three teams for Broadwater High School in an event called Academic Olympics. The first team included Berlin Korr, Karsyn Sangray, Jazlyn Martin, Ashley Sanderson, and Marek Easter. The second team held Sienna Everett, Cooper Hines, Aspen Slyker, and Lexi Davies. Last but not least, the final team was Caleb Lelacheur, Kaitlyn Noyes, Luci Horne, and Eric Eichinger. These students put in countless hours of breaks during the school day, out-of-school hours, and even personal time at home to study everything they could about sciences, mathematics, language arts, and history.
On March 15th, these teams traveled to Bozeman with their coaches, Mrs. Moldenhauer and Mrs. Bleile, to spend a day in the Strand Union Building at Montana State University to compete against schools across the state via a double elimination bracket. Unfortunately, by around halfway through the competition, each team had lost out. However, even in that circumstance, they never ceased to show good sportsmanship.
Academic Olympics are fairly simple. Depending on the number of teams competing, there are at least three rounds. Each round is conducted at around the same time. During each round, two teams will sit across from each other around a table, provided buzzers are tested, and rules and procedures will be reviewed. After standardized rules are read and understood by the players the round begins. There are nine toss-up questions. Either team can buzz in to answer the question. Whichever team gets it right gains five points.
The team who successfully answered the toss-up question received a bonus question. During this question, team members can converse to evaluate what the answer may be before buzzing in. After the toss-up question and bonus question are answered (whether correct or incorrect) the next round within the round begins. The members are always given 15 seconds to conclude and they get 30 seconds for the mathematics questions. Once a player buzzes in, they are given 10 seconds to answer. This layout for the competition further puts pressure on the students, making the competition all the more challenging.
Broadwater High School had many intelligent and bright children compete and overall it was a success for them all.
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PhotoCredit: Mikayla Kraft
Image 1 Caption: Luci Horne and Eric Eichinger preparing for their next round
