Star Wars and brain battles
Liechtenstein is up for rent.
That’s right, thanks to economist Karl Schwärzler, who won the Ignoble prize for economics in 2003, it is now possible to rent the entire country for corporate conventions, weddings, bar mitzvahs and other gatherings.
Sound like “Ripley’s Believe it or Not?”
Well, this and many other “facts” were expected to be basic knowledge for participants of the 20th annual Academic Olympiad, which included the Star Wars competition.
In all, 26 high schools (mostly from northern Utah) were in attendance for this year’s “brain bowl” which tested students in their overall knowledge of four different areas: math, social science, science and literature.
Literature is the only area that tests on assigned readings which are changed every year, the rest are taken from high school core curriculum. This year, the readings were “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” by Hemingway, “Selections from Common Sense,” by Thomas Paine and poetry by William Blake.
According to Linda Morrison, an English teacher and the coach for Morgan High, the preparation begins years before the students have ever heard of the competition.
“Basically, the students have to have been in some strong academic core classes,” Morrison said. “That’s really where the preparation comes from and then we go back and review from there.”
The overall winner of the competition, John Holbrook, a senior at Layton High School, would agree.
“The tests weren’t very fun, but they’re over,” Holbrook said. “And really, all the preparation is what you’ve done since kindergarten and there’s not much you can do to prepare or cram, because the tests test on such a wide variety of topics.”
Morrison said, “I think this kind of competition encourages students who are motivated academically to become even more motivated, and to become better and learn more because they’re really seeing the best in the northern part of Utah and if they can get a feel for what other students are doing academically and where they stand in relation, it’s a wonderful thing.”
After the individual exams were finished, the students enjoyed a hardy lunch and prepared for the afternoon competition: Star Wars.
“The Star Wars competitions is a lot of fun,” Holbrook said. “It’s all luck on what questions you get. The best way to prepare for it is to just study current events and see if you get lucky.”
During Star Wars, the students compete both individually and as a team. The students were allowed 10 seconds for individual questions and 30 for team.
With topics including Hurricane Isabel, Shakespeare’s plays and his nemesis’, major industry in Central American Countries, Nobel, Ignoble, and Pulitzer Prize winners, geography, math and science, the students were pushing the academic envelope.
One of the questions asked students to complete the pattern of 7, 7, 5, 1, 2, 8. The answer is found by adding all the numbers in the sequence together until arriving at a single digit number (i.e. 7+7+5+1+2+8=30, 3+0=3)
“[The Star Wars competition] was hard,” said Mary Anne Garner, a junior majoring in early childhood and elementary education who attended the event. “There were a lot of questions that I would never have known the answers to in high school or now. I think it’s good for high school students because it encourages them to learn more about the world around them.”
One of last year’s participants, Clark Brinton, a freshman majoring in mechanical engineering, wasn’t as pleased with this year’s competition.
“I think the competition was kind of a crock,” he said. “The administrators had a lot of questions they messed up on, and a lot of the questions were irrelevant. It seemed to be a lot more unorganized this year. I think overall the students were smarter than the individuals running the event.”
Though there were some glitches, most in attendance felt that the Olympiad was a success. In the end, Viewmont High took first place in the Academic Olympiad overall, and Davis High won the Star Wars competition.
-mattgo@cc.usu.edu
Stephen Jenkins, of Viewmont High School, reacts after missing a question in the Star Wars portion of the Academic Olympiad competition. (Photo by Ryan Talbot)
Students from Viewmont High School listen as a question is read during Wednesday´s Academic Olympiad. (Photo by Ryan Talbot)