Academic Decathlon

Staff report

youngstown

Last month, students from Youngstown Christian School competed against 24 schools from Northwestern Pennsylvania in this year’s first Academic Decathlon competition.

The competition, which took place at Mercyhurst College, focused on art, music and language and literature surrounding the national annual theme, “The Age of Imperialism.” Out of nearly 400 students and 24 schools, including public magnet schools, Youngstown Christian School’s team took home the second-place trophy for overall score and also placed second in the live portion of the competition, the Super Quiz Relay. The United States Academic Decathlon is the nation’s foremost scholastic competition for high school students. More than 2,000 schools participate nationwide. In the Northwest Pennsylvania league, more than $14 million in scholarships have been awarded in the past 15 years. Youngstown Christian senior Dana Swogger took home the overall gold medal for the entire competition, having outscored all other competitors that day.

“I won’t say it was easy,” Dana said. “This gold medal represents hundreds of hours of studying.”

Youngstown Christian senior Brandon Bankston scored the only perfect score in the competition, a 1,000 in Interview.

The team’s coaches, David Reichard, Brittany Zetts and Carla Jenkins had the honor of awarding each medal.

“Our victory on Saturday shows that even a small school can compete against the best and the brightest,” Reichard said. “We are in this competition to win.”

Medals at the competition included the following: Honors Division: Dana Swogger: gold in Overall Score, gold in Art, gold in Super Quiz Relay, silver in Speech, bronze in Language & Literature, bronze in Essay; Cate Faull: silver in Overall Score, silver in Language & Literature, silver in Speech, silver in Super Quiz Relay; Charlie Spirtos: gold in Essay, silver in Music, bronze in Art, silver in Super Quiz Relay; Scholastic Division: Jessica Gobel: silver in Super Quiz Relay; Courtney Gobel: bronze in Interview, silver in Super Quiz Relay, gold in Music, gold in Speech; Vincent Talley: bronze in Speech, bronze in Art, silver in Super Quiz Relay; Varsity Division: Alex Earp: bronze in Overall Score, bronze in Speech, bronze in Music, silver in Super Quiz Relay; Brandon Bankston: silver in Super Quiz Relay, gold in Interview; Chase Miles: gold in Overall Score, gold in Speech, gold in Music, silver in Essay, silver in Art, and silver in Super Quiz Relay.

Team members Perry Chickonoski, Shakira Graham, Christina Fortini, and Zachary Cornell also competed Saturday.

The Youngstown Christian School Academic Decathlon team is preparing for its next competition today at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College in Erie, Pa., where they will test on mathematics and science.