On Feb. 6, 2014, Prince George competed in the Conference 12 Academic Challenge competition against local high school teams. They finished in 3rd place behind Clover Hill and Matoaca, who finished 1st and 2nd respectively, and ahead of Meadowbrook, who finished 4th.
Academic Challenge is a trivia competition pitting high schools and four team members against each other in a Jeopardy-esque manner. High schools from across the state regularly face-off in these “battles of the brains” to see who can outsmart the opposition.
With a squad of 11, Prince George’s team is full of depth, broad academic strengths, and especially diversity. They are very competitive and are devoted to expanding their educational boundaries while hanging out with classmates and friends.
“I like Academic Challenge because I enjoy learning new bits of knowledge,” senior co-captain Adam Kyle said. “I also get to play a fun game with some of my best friends while getting to study fun, unique facts.”
Although frustrating at times, team members continuously stress the benefits that come along with involvement in Academic Challenge.
“Academic Challenge is beneficial because I get to exercise my brain while having fun!” senior Kevin Hopkins said.
With abundant advantages, Academic Challenge offers a platform for students who desire to test their knowledge of anything from History, Science, Math, English and more. This broad spectrum of trivia allows students of all educational strengths and backgrounds to have opportunities to display their intelligence to all.
Despite widespread stereotypes that this is a youth version of Jeopardy, the format of these competitions are undoubtedly not comparable.
“Two teams submit four players to play in the first round. In the first round, fifteen free-for-all questions are asked, also known as a toss-up round,” Kyle said. “The second round consists of ten team questions where discussion amongst team members is allowed. This set also consists of 10 questions for each team, changing every other question. The third round is another toss-up. A substitution for any of the four team members is allowed in between rounds one and two and rounds two and three. The team with the most points in the end wins.”
Last year, Academic Challenge placed second at districts and competed at regionals.
“Gaining somewhat random knowledge that might be helpful in the future along with teamwork are just a few of the benefits,” senior Samantha Rodriguez said.
