The North Penn High School Academic Decathlon team traveled to Minneapolis in April, representing the state of Pennsylvania as champion and rounded up an impressive count of medals coming out of the National Competition.

Special recognition goes to Scott Landes, who earned a silver medal in math, Matt Zarenkiewicz, who earned a silver medal in essay, Sam Curlee, who earned a bronze medal in economics and the award for Highest Individual Score on the team and Team MVP, and Kris Robinson, who won the Kristen Caperton Award for Most Inspiring Decathlete. The team finished sixth in the Large School Division as well as earning an award for “Best Rookie Team.”

Spirit of Competition

Team member and senior Patrick Nicodemus, who had previously brought home eight gold medals out of the possible ten categories in the Varsity Division at the state competition, talks of the appeal of the competition: “If you have competition in your blood, Academic Decathlon will draw you in…. No one ever quits after the first competition because they have the taste of those medals and there is just no going back. You step off that stage with the medals jangling around your neck and you can’t quit after that.”

The spirit of competition has been a driving force that carried the team’s momentum to the national competition.

“There is no better feeling than walking away from states with a gold medal around your neck and knowing that nobody else in the state put in as much effort as your team did,” said sophomore Jerry Zhao, who had won one gold medal in art and four bronze medals in social science, math, science, and economics at the State Competition.

Zhao already has goals for future competitions: “Next year I’m going to beat Sam Curlee. Also I want more medals.”

“We Were Doing It for Each Other”

“The best thing about Academic Decathlon is the nine people I got to learn and work with everyday,” said team captain Matt Zarenkiewicz.

Having been through countless study sessions, the members have formed incredible bonds and strong friendships with each other.

“[A big] motivator to study comes from the group atmosphere that goes along with learning the information,” Scott Landes, who earned a silver medal in mathematics at the National Competition, explained. “Everyone who makes it on to the state team has a desire to learn stuff and when we all meet at someone’s house or at a local Barnes & Nobles, people feel more motivated to read the packets or go through online notecards.”

“The exhaustion and the mental overload of the whole thing really wore us out, but we were suffering together, and we were doing it for each other,” Nicodemus explained. “I think to a large extent we weren’t really competing against the other teams, we were basically studying because we didn’t want to let each other down.”

“I’m so lucky to have worked with the team and I’m proud to say that we have all forged some lifelong friendships through Academic Decathlon,” said Kris Robinson.

Is Academic Decathlon for You?

As the seniors – Bogert, Lamb, Landes, Nicodemus, Robinson, and Zarenkiewicz – prepare to graduate, the team is recruiting for new members.

“Academic Decathlon is a club for people who like learning stuff and acquiring knowledge, but don’t like doing the busywork typically associated with the conventional education system’s homework assignments,” said Landes.

“The workload is a different kind of workload from what you’re used to. You don’t write essays. You don’t take mandatory notes. You don’t do worksheets. [You] just learn the information in a social environment of other people who like learning too.”

“If you are really smart, and enjoy thinking and learning, but you have bad grades because of homework and stuff like that, we really want you,” described Nicodemus, rather biographically.

“There is a very rare class of person who likes learning because knowledge is a fun thing to have, and they don’t like the conventional [education] system because it doesn’t fit them,” Nicodemus continued. “Those are the kids we want. The kids that break the mold. Please come out next year.”

Next year’s national competition will be held at Honolulu, Hawaii.