Minnesota Academic Decathlon

Mankato Hosts the Minnesota
Regional Academic Decathlon Competition

On February 8, 2006 approximately 100 students from 10 high school teams competed in the Minnesota Regional Academic Decathlon competition at the Midwest Wireless Civic Center in Mankato. High schools from Avalon, Lake Crystal-Wellcome-Memorial, MACCRAY, Mankato East, Mankato West, Red Rock Central, St. Peter, Lakeville North, Windom, and Canton, South Dakota met to test their skills. Regional winners advance to state competition on March 6–7, 2006 at Cragun’s in Brainerd.

Participating schools are separated in two divisions, large and small schools, with the top five teams from each division advancing to the state competition. St. Peter High School won first place honors in the large school division followed by Mankato West in second, and Lakeville North in third place. LCWM won first place honors in the small school division, followed by Avalon in second and Windom High School in third place. For a complete listing of team and individual place winners, please visit the MN Academic Decathlon website at: http://www.mnscsc.org/student_outreach/mnad/ad.html and click on “scores”.

Academic Decathlon^TM, the premiere national scholastic competition for high school students, was created to provide opportunities for students to experience the challenges of rigorous team and individual academic competition. Each student competes in ten events: Economics, Essay, Art, Interview, Language and Literature, Math, Music, Science, Social Science and Speech. Each year the Science or Social Science topic is used for the Super Quiz topic.

The ten-event academic program strives to foster a greater respect for knowledge, to promote wholesome inter-school academic competition, and to further develop student communication skills. A unique aspect of Academic Decathlon is that it is designed to include students from all academic abilities and achievement levels. Each nine-member team consists of three “A” (Honors division), three “B” (Scholastic division), and three “C or below” (Varsity division) students. Each team member competes in all 10 events against other students in their individual divisions, however, team scores are calculated using the top two individual scores from each division to arrive at an overall team score.

Gold, silver, and bronze medals are awarded for individual events and team scores. Overall individual winners are recognized as well as champion teams. The broad base of awards allows for recognition of academic accomplishment. Teams advance through local, regional and state levels of competition. The state champions compete at the national finals. This year’s national event will take place in San Antonio, Texas.

A new theme of study is established every year to provide topics that are relevant, current and challenging. This year’s theme is “The European Renaissance” with the super quiz portion of the competition focused on the social science perspective of the Renaissance. Students will compose an essay (based on a prompt, whose theme incorporates information relevant to the current curriculum,) as well as perform a prepared speech and an impromptu speech, and participate in an interview before a panel of community volunteer judges. The Academic Decathlon emphasizes the personal and academic growth of each student who, by meeting the challenges with honesty and integrity, can reap the rewards of greater self-knowledge and self-confidence for the future.

Interested in learning more about the Minnesota Academic Decathlon, or want to learn how to become a sponsor or volunteer? Please visit www.mnscsc.org or call: Wanda Sommers Nielsen at 507-389-1076. The Minnesota Academic Decathlon is sponsored in part by an academic grant from Midwest Wireless.