PHOTO/ Kaylee Eiber, Amy Ta, Madison Zhou “Joshua and Phoenix select the team, coach the members and ask students which events they’re interested in,” Slattery said. “I don’t have to coach at all. I feel like they did amazing. Whether we’re first place or sixth place, I’m very proud of what they do.”
By Amilia Wu,
Staff Writer
The TCHS Science Olympiad team competed at the Bird Science Olympiad Invitational on Jan. 28, marking the school’s first time hosting the event. 77 Division C high school SciOly teams from across the United States gathered on campus to compete in various event categories.
Led by senior captains Phoenix He and Joshua Hsu, the team participated in all 27 events, placing sixth overall. Notably, they won first in “Experimental Design” and “Flight,” and placed top 10 in 11 other categories.
The BirdSO offered 23 official events and four trial events during the full-day competition. Official events counted towards the overall placements, while trial events didn’t affect the team’s total score.
As this was the first year of BirdSO on campus, a few events encountered technical errors. However, the competition this year served as a learning experience for both the school and the BirdSO organizers.
Due to the event’s overall success, they hope to coordinate this event on campus for years to come. Nevertheless, BirdSO will move to another school should any issues arise with TCHS hosting once more.
“We are interested in supporting a program that a segment of our student population enjoys doing, excels at any and all those things,” coach Vinson Bell said. “When we first broke the news to the team that we were actually going to host this event, there was some disbelief. We just kind of picked it up along the way. Mr. [Kevin] Slattery and I realized that there’s value in that, the way it inspires the kids. So you know, why not?”
Superintendent Interim Dr. Katherine Fundukian-Thorossian and present superintendent Dr. Art Cunha oversaw the event, accompanied by district personnel working to prepare the campus for competition day.
BirdSO event organizers, along with student and teacher volunteers, also worked to bring the annual event to school grounds.
The school met with the organizers and volunteers to determine the logistics of BirdSO on campus, such as number of classrooms, opportunities for various community organizations and staffing.
Administration also partnered with the City of Temple City to assist with traffic control in anticipation of the event’s large scale.
SciOly has been a science competition program at TCHS for over two decades. Through the years, students have branched out to varied competition categories and subjects, eventually joining build events.
Coaches Slattery and Bell worked with the team and the district to ensure the success of the BirdSO campus event.
The SciOly team meets three days a week, both on- and off-campus, and travel to different invitationals and competitions. On Feb. 11, the team visited UC Berkeley to compete at the Golden Gate Science Olympiad Invitational. As they continue their season, they will head to the Los Angeles regional competition at Rio Hondo College on March 4.
“I think that BirdSO was very successful,” Slattery said. “I think we’ll do it again next year. Experience for the planning team, and for us as hosts, will enable TCUSD to improve the experience for everyone.”