High School North and Community Middle School, both New Jersey state champs, performed well at the 34th National Science Olympiad held at Colorado State University May 18 and 19.
CMS finished in third place overall in Division B, and HSN placed eighth in Division C. The teams contested in an field of 60 teams in their respective divisions.
The Science Olympiad National Tournament is the one of the top competition for 120 of the country’s best science olympiad teams, representing more than 2,000 students.
Founded in 1984, the Science Olympiad is one of the premier science competitions in the nation, providing rigorous, standards-based challenges to 7,800 teams in all 50 states. One team from Japan—Eikou High School, also participated in the competition.
A total of 25 different science events covering various fields of sciences, including two trial events, form the National Science Olympiad tournament for each division.
Groups of two to three students participate in the individual events that cover areas including: biology—anatomy and physiology, microbe mission; physics—astronomy and hovercraft; chemistry—chem lab and poisons and potions; and build events—towers and helicopters.
The CMS team was coached by Lisa Sacca. Assistant coach Sven Strnad and Stephanie Hornick joined the team as chaperones.
The HSN team was coached by Regina Celin and Holly Crochetiere. Retired Science Olympiad coach James Looney also joined the team as chaperone.
Besides the overall team awards, the following students earned medals in their respective events.
High School North: Jason Yang and Vainavi Mukkamala, second place, anatomy and physiology; Jason Yang and Soumil Mukherjee, first place, astronomy; Jonathan Wang and Ranjan Mahanth, sixth place, chem lab; Arsh Rupani and Shivani Prusty, fifth place, helicopters; Akila Saravanan and Jason Yang, fifth place, hovercraft; Arsh Rupani and Nikhita Subbiah, fifth place, mousetrap vehicle; Jason Yang and Katherine Zhang, fifth place, remote sensing; Arsh Rupani and Nikhita Subbiah, sixth place, towers; and Michelle Tong, Ranjan Mahanth and Leo Yao, fourth place, code busters (trial event).
Community Middle School: Keshav Ratra and Ria Verma, fifth place, anatomy and physiology; Akhil Paulraj and Jason Chang; fifth place, battery buggy; Keshav Ratra and Srinivas Sowmiyanarayanan, third place, fast facts; Parth Shastri and Vivek Vajipey, second place, solar system; Arvyn De and Parth Shastri, first place, thermodynamics.
Members of the High School North Science Olympiad Team. Back: coach Holly Crochetiere (left), coach Regina Celin, Arsh Rupani, Jason Yang and Xihang Wang. Middle: Soumil Mukherjee (left), Leo Yao, Ranjan Mahanth, Shivani Prusty, Vainavi Mukkamala, Jonathan Wang and former coach and chaperone James Looney. Front: Timothy Dai, Michelle Tong, Akila Saravanan, Katherine Zhang, Nikhita Subbiah, Sophia Xu, Ishita Deshmukh and Mridul Bansal.,
