Valley Teams in Academic Contest

Two teams of San Fernando Valley high school students finished their first day of competition Friday in the California Academic Decathlon, with one team oozing confidence and the other expressing doubts.

The students, from El Camino Real High School in Woodland Hills and Alemany High School in Mission Hills, are up against 40 other teams in the 17th annual California contest. And although they may be from the same neck of the woods, the teenagers had decidedly different reactions to their first day of competition.

As the energetic nine-member team from Alemany piled out of its mini-van back at the hotel, one of the students was asked how the day had gone.

The reply was a mock scream of terror.

Another student described the testing as “a sin against humanity.”

“We weren’t really expecting some of the things on the test,” said Erik Rosete, a 17-year-old Alemany senior. “So we’re hoping for the best, but we’re expecting the worst.”

Not so for members of the El Camino team.

“I think overall things went really well,” said 17-year-old Matthew Backes from El Camino. “For the most part our studying was right on the mark.”

Sarah Sabolek, an 18-year-old El Camino decathlete, was cautiously optimistic.

“I don’t know how we did. The tests were very hard, but that could be good or bad,” Sabolek said. “It could be good, because if they’re hard, more teams will get knocked out, but it’s a double-sided sword.”

And so it went Friday as the two teams concluded the first round in the three-day event at Cal State Fresno. The students began Friday with an orientation session, followed by four hours of testing, and finished with a spaghetti dinner, which the Alemany students said they planned to skip so they could squeeze in a couple of more hours of studying.

The competition continues today with more testing and culminates with the Super Quiz, a rowdy game-show style quiz that is the only public event in the decathlon and often foretells the overall winner of the state contest.

El Camino, which swept the Los Angeles Unified School District Academic Decathlon in November, is viewed as a top contender for the big prize, as are teams from Laguna Hills and Beverly Hills high schools. Alemany, which won the private schools’ Academic Decathlon, is competing for the first time in the state competition.

“We’re the best private school here from Southern California,” declared Darryl Hwang, a 17-year-old senior from Alemany. Nevermind, he pointed out, that as far as he could tell from reading the program, Alemany is the only private school entered in the event.

“I think it’s going to be a close race between us, El Camino and maybe Laguna,” Darryl said. “We’re the underdog, but will give them a run for their money.”