The KSM Academic Decathlon team received third place out of five schools competing at the yearly Hawaiʻi Academic Decathlon hosted by Waiakea High School in Hilo, Friday and Saturday, Feb. 22-23.

“I’m really proud of our AcaDec team.  For just our second year, we had a very strong showing. I’m hopeful we can continue to improve and become more competitive in the future,” said Ms. Naomi McCall, the faculty adviser.

There are three levels within the team of seven decathletes. Madison Williams and Makayla Imaoka are in honors, the highest level. Elijah Cole Tabion and Danann Mitchell are in the scholastic team and Brissa Christopherson, Preston Watanabe, and Ilena Burk make up the varsity team.  The decathlon team has room for up to nine members.

“To become part of the team, you need to fit the criteria, have the right GPA, not your school calculated GPA, but the AcaDec calculated GPA, and commit to be a participant, part of the team,” Ms. McCall said.

They have practiced every Friday after school since the start of school in August. The topic this year was World War 1. All of their studying revolved around this topic.

At the event, students compete in five main areas: speech, essay, interview, tests of knowledge (one in each subject area — art, music, social science, science, economics, language and literature, and mathematics. ), and the super quiz.

“We ordered booklets on each of the seven subjects that we were going to be tested on, and then we had to prepare a speech, and we also had to do an essay [for practice],” said junior Madison Williams, team captain.

All of the team members received a bronze medal for their team performance, but a few members also won individual medals of their own.

Bronze Medals:

• Tabion in mathematics
• Burk in science
• Christopherson in math.

Silver Medals:

• Tabion in interview
• Watanabe in science

The KSM Academic Decathlon team gets their 2015 topic some time this month, so they can already start getting ready for next year.

Gallery • 3 Photos

Photo by Courtesy of Ms. Suda

The KS Maui Academic Decathlon team placed third out of five schools competing in Hilo, Feb. 22-23.