The first ever Science Olympiad was in Delaware in 1974 and was composed of only fifteen schools. It was a place where the brightest of STEM brains tested their skills against each other. Nowadays, across all the high schools and middle schools across the United States, 7,800 teams compete each year for the Science Olympiad, and one of those schools is Rancho Cucamonga High School.
With a curriculum that calls for mastery and hunger for growth in all sciences from anatomy to robotics, while only being able to compete with fifteen people per team and only seven seniors, the rest consisted of wildcards. These students who compete for Rancho are expected to be able to compete in one to two categories at the fullest of their ability for both.
The president and re-founder of the Science Olympiad club, sophomore Ilia Shojaei brought the club back on its feet after not being active since 2012. He took the initiative to do so when he was only a freshman at Rancho.
“I started it myself because I thought it was unfortunate that we didn’t have a Science Olympiad,” Shojaei said.
Due to them being a technically new club, their re-debut started at the Inland Empire Regional Tournament, where they placed 13th overall out of 33 schools in competition. Their peaks were in sections of chemistry lab and “write it do it,” where they placed 3rd and 5th place, respectively. These results show the potential of the team and the dedication that they have brought to the table already.
With the club being brought back only last year, it would seem like there would be an issue finding members, but for this club, that doesn’t seem to be an issue with many crucial roles already being filled. Interest in the club is strong and it’s apparent that students want to explore sciences outside of the classroom.
Senior and officer Qisheng (Jason) Zheng shares what made him want to join the Science Olympiad.
“I knew that I liked STEM, but I wanted to know what part I like and what parts I would probably like,” Zheng said.
On top of looking good on college applications, it allows for students of all ages to gain experience in competition-like settings, develop teamwork and collaboration skills, problem solving skills, and the skills to think on their feet in a competitive setting when competitors are under pressure.
When it comes to preparing for these competitions, it takes a lot of time and preparation to ensure a good performance at these competitions. With the team meeting biweekly on Wednesdays, they have little time to perfect their collaboration, but they make up for this time by perfecting their individual skills.
Senior and member Luke Tucker shares how the team prepares for competitions.
“A lot of studying after school, especially with the people that we are going to be doing the events with,” Tucker said.
These preparation meetings are the true reasons for their success. They allow for the students to build chemistry between each other, divide the responsibilities of the task at hand, and build confidence going into the tournaments starting next semester.
Science Olympiad is a club that allows for high school, middle school, and elementary school students alike to profess their love for the art of science in many different ways. Whether they want to build robots, work in labs for chemistry, or answer questions about entomology, the return of Science Olympiad back to Rancho’s campus isn’t just another competitive program back on the club list, but another place where students can grow their interest and challenge themself in real competitions.
