2 days Ago
Holding a buzzer in their hands, Paul Knox Middle School students were getting ready to answer a question about a character from the Marvel Universe and one student buzzed in the fastest. One of the students delivered the correct answer, Black Widow. That was an example of one of many questions they could answer as they take their knowledge to a national competition.
The academic quiz bowl team at Paul Knox Middle School will compete in a NAQT (National Academic Quiz Tournament ) for middle schools in Chicago from May 9 to 11. “We are the first middle school in Aiken County to go since Schofield about 10 years ago,” Paul Knox Middle School teacher and quiz bowl coach Aaron Knowles said. An academic quiz is a team of students who compete and answer trivia questions on a variety of topics like science, history and geography while working together as a team.
"Basically what it is is a team trivia contest where they sit there and have questions about all kinds of different things,” he said. The current team is made up of 22 students, but 10 of the students are part of team A, which came in second place at the regional competition that was held March 22 at Aiken High School. Two members of the team competed in the past, so many members of the team are in sixth or seventh grade.
Paul Knox will be competing against 159 other schools for the top spot in Chicago. Paul Knox Middle School math teach and quiz bowl coach Heather Parliament-Griffith said the team was supposed to go to a national competition in 2020, but as soon the team was about to leave the pandemic happened “We raised all the money we needed to go and literally the day before we were about to purchase the plane tickets, NAQT emailed and told us the competition was canceled,” she said. “Within the next week school was shut down here.
” Parliament-Griffith said the students have been working really hard and it feels like they are ready for Chicago. “It’s very impressive that we made it this far,” she said Knowles said the team was invited to the national competition after they won the tournament at Aiken. He said it's the first time Paul Knox will be going to Chicago to compete, but other schools have traveled out of Aiken for competitions.
Knowles also said the competition will give some of the students a chance to experience Chicago. “That is part of the appeal to us,” he said. “The competition will be really cool and getting them into a large city and having the experience on the train and having some deep-dish pizza.
" Paul Knox eighth-grader Steven Dunham got involved with the Quiz Bowl team because his brother was on the team and he saw how much fun he had. “I love learning and I love a little bit of competition,” he said. He has been on the team for the last two years.
“I have never personally been, but I can’t wait for it and think it will be a really good city to be around, cool stuff,” he said. “I really hope we win.” He also said he enjoys learning and competition.
“Honestly I just teach myself some of the stuff,” he said. Another student, Noah Stalvey, said she became part of the team because she was looking for an extracurricular activity to do in school and a lot of her friends were on the team last year. “I joined and they were like, what makes you good for the academic team,” she said.
“I was like, I watch Jeopardy all the time." Stalvey said she is confident that the team will rank high during the competition and likes winning, but really enjoys spending time with her teammates. “It’s really nice to nerd out with people," she said.
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