It was a morning of accomplishments at Granada Hills Charter High School (GHCHS) on Tuesday, where the administration honored its many academic and athletic teams and their achievements. But the stars of the day were its Academic Decathlon team, which won the school’s 10th national title.
The team of nine students scored more than 52,000 points at the United States Academic Decathlon, held from April 23-25 in Des Moines, Iowa. GHCHS outscored the second-place winner and last year’s champion, El Camino Real Charter High School, by approximately 3,000 points. They now continue a 23-year streak as a California school winning the championship.
The team champions this year are Saadan Atif, Tale Chen, Serena Chon, Benjamin Cruz, Emmanuel Dominguez, Santiago Garcia-Uriarte, Christopher Gonzalez, Francesca Molina and Mia Salinas. Altogether, they won 42 individual medals and accomplishments.
Each team is divided into three groups based on each student’s GPA: honors (3.8 and above), scholastic (3.3-3.7) and varsity (3.2 and below). For GHCHS, four of the students placed in the top three among their groups – Chon got second place in honors, Garcia-Uriarte won second in scholastic and Gonzalez and Dominguez got first and second in varsity, respectively.
More than a hundred GHCHS students assembled in the gym to congratulate them and other extracurricular teams. These included the G-Notes Show Choir, ending their competition season in first place and winning the best musicianship award, and the boys’ basketball team, winning the CIF Los Angeles City Section Division I.
Taking the podium, Chen, one of two returning students to the team, talked about what it was like to be a leader and recalled the countless hours she and her teammates put towards studying. To her, the biggest challenge was seeing all the effort they put into the team only to lose in the regional competition in January.
Nonetheless, the team persevered and came back to win both the state and national championships.
“I learned what it was like to lead, not to be the boss or to have all the answers, but to support my teammates in the ways that I can,” Chen said. “I’m so incredibly grateful to have been a part of this team during my last year in high school, and I will be taking all the lessons I learned with me to college next year.”
Head Coach Tyler Lee congratulated his students, saying, “Every student brought something unique to the team this year: leadership, outside-of-the-box thinking as a newcomer, but everyone was encouraging and focused. And we leaned into that interdependence and trust in one another.”
Gonzalez, a senior and the other returning student, recalled how, during his first year, his teammates with prior experience competing in the national decathlon helped him prepare for the championship. This time, now with firsthand knowledge, he took on that same role to be a leader on the team alongside Chen.
“I always tried to be that kind of anchor when we were studying and … to keep everyone on task and to always push us to be the best that we could,” Gonzalez said. “So having that experience under my belt really helped me be able to do that.”
Having been in the varsity group both years, Gonzalez admitted that when he first joined, he felt he needed to prove something not only to other people, but himself, adding that he felt he wasn’t able to do that during his first two years in high school.
However, he realized that all nine members are working towards the same goal. That’s not to say that Gonzalez didn’t have his own noteworthy accomplishments this year. In the 10 subjects students competed in, Gonzalez won a gold medal in five and a silver medal in two, and was voted as his team’s most valuable player.
“It’s definitely been an interesting journey,” Gonzalez said. “Obviously, coming into it, when I saw that there were people on that team that had so much higher GPAs, … I felt that I had to prove to myself … that I could be as capable as them.
“I was definitely not as confident [when I started], but I pushed myself to keep that same confidence and to keep that same work ethic the entire year, and I was able to … prove to myself that I am capable of something greater than myself, and capable of [rising] to the level of [winning] the entire division.”
Atif was one of the many newbies to the team, placing fourth in the scholastic group. He humorously recounted that when he first learned about the academic decathlon, he was hesitant to join but was persuaded when he learned he could get a varsity cardigan if he made the team.
But reflecting on his journey, he’s grateful for the life lessons and skills he’s learned along the way, as well as the importance of perseverance and pushing forward no matter what.
“There were some days where I was extremely tired, but I had that [determination] to keep pushing forward because of everybody around me,” Atif said. “I saw them struggling with me … and I’m so glad I’ve done it this year, especially because as a senior, it’s my last year of high school, and it couldn’t have gone any better. I wouldn’t trade this for anything in the world.”
When asked how he felt getting honored in front of a gym full of his peers, he said, “It’s almost surreal, because starting off, we always knew our goal was to win nationals, and you’re seeing that goal finally realized after … almost an entire year of blood, sweat and tears. It’s like, whoa, we made it. We’re here now.”
Ten titles is impressive. What do you think has contributed to their success over the years?