By Mikayla Weiss, Sports Editor
While many students were resting over the weekend, some of your fellow mariners were still doing chemistry experiments, taking MCQs, and even designing engineering blueprints. Those mariners are in Science Olympiad! Moreau Catholic competed in the Science Olympiad competition Sunday, March 7. Do you know what Science Olympiad is? If you don’t, it’s time to find out and also see how we did this year.
Science Olympiad has 23 different events that students can compete in. At Moreau, each student competed in three to four events. Each event is different from each other and can range from taking written tests to performing chemistry experiments. This year, they started practicing in September, working every Tuesday and Thursday from 3-5 p.m.
Practice looks different for everyone. Some people may be working on their cheat sheet, studying their study guide, or collecting materials for their build. Practice is very self-paced and depends on which events you have.
Last year was Moreau’s first year with a Science Olympiad team. Vihaan Kant and Shaurya Gupta approached Mr. Austin Reaker their freshman year, begging him to start the team, because they participated in previous years in Science Olympiad. Eventually, he decided he would moderate it and became the Science Olympiad coach.
Last year, Moreau competed with 28 students, but this year, they competed with 48 students.
For this year’s competition, the Alameda Regional Science Olympiad was held at Cal State East bay in Hayward. Students spent 12 hours on the CSUEB campus on Saturday from 8 a.m. until 8 p.m.. The events are in hour-long time slots. Students must know their time slot and where the event is taking place.
“Everyone’s running around, everyone’s doing a lot of things, everyone’s stressed about the test they’re going to take or how their build is going to do. But there’s also a lot of fun hanging out in our tent, whether that’s eating, resting, or running around with a soccer ball,” Reaker says.
Unlike a track meet, you don’t know how well you’ve done immediately after your events, so rather than hanging around anxiously waiting for the awards ceremony to begin, Mr. Reaker and fellow moderator Ms. Annemarie Bosl walked with the students to Bronco Billy’s off campus and ate pizza.
This year, two teams from Moreau won medals. I had the opportunity to compete with my fellow freshman classmate Anthony Magana and we were thrilled to win third place. We won in the Engineering CAD event. This is the first year that Engineering CAD is an event in Science Olympiad. CAD stands for computer animated design and it’s where you have to build designs on OnShape based on a blueprint.
In sixth place, senior Krish Lal and junior Kai Khoo competed and won in Bungee Drop. Bungee drop is a building event where you build a cord and when during the event, they give you a weight to put on your cord and you have to drop it closest to the ground without touching the floor.
In the end, the competition inspires everyone for the following year to practice more and try harder the next year so they can do the best possible. It is always an incredible experience to learn new skills, make friends, and possibly even get a medal.
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