Granada Hills Charter High School (GHC) has advanced to the United States Academic Decathlon competition after winning the state competition.
The winners earned a total of 54,021.1 points, taking first place overall, and sending the team to the national championship next month. The United States Academic Decathlon begins on April 8 and culminates in an awards ceremony on May 1.
El Camino Real Charter High School finished second with 53,665.50 points. Mark Keppel High School in Los Angeles was third, and Grant High School placed fourth.
“The team wants to thank their coaches and parents for all their support. The students are looking forward to representing Granada Hills Charter in what will be a very competitive and tough national competition,” says Brian Bauer, GHC executive director.
The theme of this year’s Academic Decathlon season is “The Cold War,” requiring students to study subjects within that context. Students compete in subject areas including science, literature, art, music, social science, economics, mathematics, speech, interview and essay.
This year’s winning team of students is Dwaipayan Chanda, Eunice Choi, Joshua Choi, Rachel Heo (alternate), Chloe Hyun, Aroa Kim (alternate), Justin Kim, Hirusha Liyanage, Anthony Mercado (alternate), Jasdeep Sidhu, and Zorex Villadelgado, Jr. The coaches are Alina Lee, Linda Kang and Amy Contreras.
Each school enters a field of students from the following GPA categories, — “A” students (honors), “B” students (scholastic), and “C or below” (varsity).
Chanda and Sidhu, who had the second the third highest individual student point totals, have also received the PECG (Professional Engineers in California Government) Math-Science Scholarship.