The THS Science Olympiad continued its success streak at the Columbia and Princeton Invitationals, placing 9th out of 72 teams on January 25 and 11th out of 52 teams on February 1 respectively. Science Olympiad, also known as SciOly by many THS students, is a club which attends competitions to put students’ scientific skills to the test. Traditionally, there are two people per event and together they divide the work evenly to optimize the process. 

There are two types of events: test-taking and build. In test-taking events, students must study scientific niches before taking a test, which will be scored and compared to students from other schools. These tests vary in difficulty, and challenge even the strongest academic students. Examples include Microbe Mission, Entomology, and Fossils.

Build events, on the other hand, require less academic rigor and more practical knowledge. In this format, students put their efforts into constructing machines to be tested at these tournaments. One example is Tower, where the goal is to create a tall stack of wood blocks while keeping the tower’s weight as low as possible. Others are Helicopter, Robot Tour, and Bungee Drop.

Each event is scored individually and added to a total score for the school; in order for the school to do well, it must have a well-rounded score throughout the events. At these most recent tournaments, Tenafly competed with dozens of teams from Massachusetts, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, New Jersey, and New York: and they still came out top ten in Columbia and as medalists at Princeton. The following lists the impressive results of both competitions.

Columbia Results:

Microbe Mission: 2nd Place: Jehee Nam and Hillary Xie

Write it Do it: 5th place: Liam Tenenbaum and Tony Yoo

Entomology: 2nd place: Kiran Muttiah and Edmund Hod

Robot Tour: 3rd place: Noah Jackson and Adir Shtalryd

Air Trajectory: 5th place: Noah Jackson and Yuval Amitai

Optics: 3rd place: Dominick Miller and Seiichiro Takayama

Quantum Quandaries: 3rd Place: Seiichiro Takayama and Gal Sternberg

Princeton Results:

Microbe Mission: 2nd place: Jehee Nam and Hillary Xie

Ecology: 4th place: Tony Yoo and Edmund Hod

Forensics: 6th place: Joe Kuwama and Sarah Baek

Optics: 6th place: Seiichiro Takayama and Dominick Miller

Air Trajectory: 5th Place: Noah Jackson and Yuval Amitai

Science Olympiad members across both competitions detailed their feelings on the last two tournaments, and the club overall.

“It’s definitely a rewarding experience, and everyone in the team puts in so much effort, so it’s great to see all that work accumulate in the actual competition,” Jehee Nam (’27) said, who medalled in Microbe Mission at both Columbia and Princeton. “There’s a few more competitions left and we’re hoping to get even more medals, especially at the States competition in March.” 

“Overall, I think we did really well at both Columbia and Princeton,” Edward Wang (’26), who previously medalled in Microbe Mission, said. “Tenafly ended up medaling in a bunch of its events, and currently the team is doing especially well compared to former years. Although I didn’t medal in any events, I felt like I learned a lot of very interesting information from my preparation and felt that the experience competing was very rewarding and worthwhile. I am looking forward to the next competitions, which will take place at Yale, UPenn, and eventually States.” 

“Science Olympiad has been a great experience… and these last two tournaments have really made me appreciate our team and the competition even more,” Noah Jackson (’26), who medalled in Air Trajectory and Robot Tour, said. “I always look forward to team bonding, early dinners, the anticipation during the awards ceremony, and every laugh and fun moment I get to experience with the team.”

With the upcoming Yale and Penn tournaments, as well as State Finals looming overhead in March, the Science Olympiad team has no shortage of work at the moment. As its students’ continue their rigorous studies and builds, the club awaits further greatness in the future.