Learn, explore and build Science Olympiad engages in numerous competitions sending them to regionals.
“The Science Olympiad team is full of great, intelligent and creative people. They work hard and are passionate about what they do. Our coaches are especially a big part of the team, they take time to volunteer, encourage, work with us and just make it all possible. Special thanks to coach Ogden. She’s amazing and does so much for the team; she brings it together, organizes everything and makes the team possible. She’s the reason (as well as other coaches and hardworking members) we’ve had such a successful season,” junior Science Olympiad member Kristal Youhana said.
Each of the members put in a number of hours and effort in order to compete at a high level. It’s not necessarily the smartest student who performs the best; it’s the ones who put in the most work, according to head coach Susan Ogden.
“Science Olympiad, especially in high school, you don’t always keep the same team. Some years we have freshmen on the team, sometimes we do not. Although the team is always having new members each year, it is still very fun to meet the new members of the team and have them join this fantastic group,” sophomore co-captain Ashna Moradia said.
One of the main challenges of the season for most schools including Ike, is creating a team of 15 members, according to Ogden. Other obstacles for the team include finding coaches. Several of the competition topics have no adult coach, requiring the members to coach themselves. Fortunately, this season 10 families stepped up to the plate to help coach which enhanced the team’s success.
“They (parents and coaches) put in many hours to help guide the students in their studies, or in providing spaces and resources for students to build devices that they demonstrate at tournaments. We can’t thrive without them. And I really like the fact that the Science Olympiad can be a family activity,” Ogden said.
Despite the difficulty level of the University of Michigan tournament, several of Eisenhower’s teams placed at the tournament. Among the 60 teams competing, the members placed various times: seniors Mason Kirsch and Daniel Tidrow won second in Place Air Trajectory; Kirsch, Tidrow and sophomore Vivian Catlin won eighth place in Codebusters; seniors Justin Loveday and Kirsch won ninth place in Robot Tour; sophomores Kara Lu and Nicholas Siemen won tenth place in Bungee Drop; Loveday and Youhana won eleventh place in Astronomy; at a tournament in the Plymouth-Canton area they received medals in 15 of the 23 competition topics.
“My favorite moment this year in Science Olympiad has been competing at the University of Michigan tournament, we got to go all around the campus to get to our events, got to go out with the team to do different activities, and we got to share the experience with the Malow team, which really built a stronger connection between all of us,” Moradia said.
The Regional Tournament is Saturday, March 15 at Macomb Community College.
“Last year, we came in second place after several years of a first-place finish. Eisenhower has done well enough to qualify for the State Tournament at MSU for the past 15 years,” Ogden said. “We hope to make Ike proud again.”
