Academic Decathletes Compete

Public and private schools across Southern California completed their regional academic decathlon competitions Saturday with game show-style quizzes, and now must wait several days before officials announce which teams will qualify for the state championship.

The Los Angeles Unified School District, the L.A. County Office of Education and an association of Southern California private and parochial schools held separate competitions. The winner of each and eight of the top overall scoring teams from all three competitions will be invited to compete in the California Academic Decathlon in Los Angeles in March.

The Super Quiz, which was themed around astronomy this year, accounts for only 5% of the competition’s final score, but serves as the only portion of the event held in public. The rest of the scoring consists of exams in subjects such as math, social sciences and art.

Marshall High School in Los Feliz won the Super Quiz in the L.A. Unified competition, unseating Los Angeles High School, which had won the Super Quiz for the last seven years. Marshall scored 57 out of a possible 60 points in the quiz, one point ahead of second-place finishers El Camino Real in Woodland Hills and two points ahead of the third-place team, Los Angeles High. The overall winner and top-scorers will be announced Thursday at a banquet at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

In the L.A. County schools competition, West High in Torrance placed first with 47 points, North High of Torrance came in second with 46 points and Burbank High and El Rancho of Pico Rivera tied for third with 45 points each. The overall winner will be announced Thursday at the Quiet Cannon restaurant in Montebello.

In the private schools’ Super Quiz, Bishop Alemany of Mission Hills finished first, followed by St. Francis of La Canada Flintridge and Mater Dei of Santa Ana. Those Super Quiz scores were not available late Saturday. The overall winners will be announced Feb. 13 at Bishop Alemany.

Had it not been for a recent deluge in donations, Saturday’s events would have marked the end of the academic decathlon season for the hundreds of students who participated.

In November, the California chapter of the academic decathlon reported dire financial conditions that threatened to cancel this year’s state competition, a move that would have prevented a California team from entering the national competition in Chicago in April.

But since then, state officials said they have raised more than $100,000 of the approximately $150,000 needed to keep the organization afloat.

The contributions include a $50,000 pledge by a coalition of private donors headed by California Education Secretary Richard Riordan. California Academic Decathlon Board President Jeff McCombs said the organization is working on lining up a sponsor for the annual state contest and also has an “informal commitment” from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to help; it was unclear whether the governor’s aid would involve state money.

The California Academic Decathlon currently receives no state aid, relying on private contributions to meet its $250,000 annual operating budget. About $100,000 of that comes from such “in-kind” donations as office space, officials said.

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Times staff writer Jean Merl contributed to this report.