St. Francis High Triumphs in Academic Decathlon

St. Francis High School’s decathlon team handily captured first place in the Southern California Private School Academic Decathlon and is one of 50 schools that will advance to the state competition in March.

The St. Francis team scored 42,171 points in the event, besting the second place team by 2,000 points. The local private school won the championships in 2003 and lost last year in a close contest, according to Academic Vice Principal Rudy Trujillo, the team’s coach.

The local squad, which collected its awards on Sunday, is comprised of seniors David Kurtz, Philip Hihn, Joseph Rueter, Bryan Davis and Eamonn Pascal and juniors Chris Saunders, Matthew Walsh, Neel Kasliwal and Michael Bicos. Each member of the team won at least two individual medals, as well as silver medals for the Super Quiz and gold medals for the team championship.

“Just before they announced the winners, the team got very pensive. When they learned they had won they were thrilled, absolutely thrilled,” said the coach, Trujillo, in a telephone interview Monday. “You always want them to feel it’s worth all the work, and second place would have been devastating to them.”

Academic Decathlon is a nationally organized scholastic competition. The private school contest included 14 schools from Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties. Students take examinations in language and literature, music, science, art, mathematics, economics, essay writing, speech and interview. There is also the Super Quiz category.

“Our kids did exceptionally well,” Trujillo said of his team. “They started studying last summer and then, once school started, met after school every single day for two hours - and that was in addition to their regular classes. We also met for six days over Christmas vacation, working five hours a day. After Christmas, they still met two hours every day and studied more at home. Then, two weekends before the decathlon, they met for 12 hours and on the week before the competition all of their free time was spent studying for it.”

And there’s more of the same to come: Trujillo said that with the upcoming statewide competition the team members will be expected to “study, study, study.”

- Carol Cormaci and Leticia Cheng