User:Aptdon

Part of Sierra Vista Middle School team Black in the 2020-2023 seasons. As an 8th grader in 2021-2022 Aptdon was a team co-captain and is returning as a 9th grader for Sierra Vista as well. Science Olympiad has been a large part of Aptdon's Middle School life and thoroughly enjoys it. In his 7th grade year Aptdon competed in Dynamic Planet Oceanography, Meteorology Severe Storms, Reach for the Stars, and Water Quality Estuaries. In 8th grade Aptdon competed in Bridges, Digital Structures, Electric Wright Stuff, Green Generation, Meteorology Climate, Mousetrap Vehicle, and Road Scholar. Meteorology is his favorite event by far. Aptdon enjoys competing in MYSO competitions for fun and he is excited for Science Olympiad in years to come.

Aptdon
General Information
Years in SO	3
Current Team	Sierra Vista Middle School (Orange County)
Grade	9th
State	SoCal
Division	B
Medals
Total medals	150 and counting 6 Trials
Invitational medals	120
Regional medals	10
State medals	9
National medals	6
MYSO medals	6
Gold medals	71
Silver medals	28
Bronze medals	9
Competitor Info
Competitions attended	50
Invitationals attended	45
Regionals attended	2 (2021, 2022)
States attended	2 (2021, 2022)
Nationals attended	1 (2022)
Events competed in	176
Volunteering
Years volunteered	1st
Number of competitions volunteered at	1
Number of tests written	First tests in the making
Social Media
Discord	aptdon#6875

2020-2021 (7th Grade)

Aptdon joined Science Olympiad as a seventh grader and at the first scrimmage did terribly with his only medal in Meteorology at 2nd place. He was placed on the third team (Chargers). It was at this point that his coach started typing his name as Gordan on every document and message. He quickly started to love all of his events except Dynamic Planet. Aptdon eventually made it to the second team (Red), and by Regionals and States made it to the first team (Black). He achieved a 22nd at MYSO Reach for the Stars and very close to 25th at MYSO Meteorology. Credits to Umaroth for coaching him in Meteorology and helping him win Meteorology at States. He tied for 7th grader most medals with Sparkly with a total of 46 medals throughout the year.

2021-2022 (8th Grade)

As an 8th grader Aptdon was one of the team co-captains and helped with coach responsibilities. Aptdon first competed in 4 events at the beginning of the year, however as the year progressed picked up more as his team needed them. By the end of the year Aptdon competed in 7 events at Nationals, medaling in 6 of them. 8th grade was an amazing season for Aptdon achieving 98 medals. This year Sierra Vista had a very special team that will never be the same, and Aptdon enjoys the times the team spent together.

2022-2023 (9th Grade)

Still in the works :D

Results

Format copied from Umaroth and Bananasaurus.

2020-2021

Yearly total: 46 medals

(tied with Sparkly for most medals for 7th graders at Sierra Vista)

Event	BearSO	UTA	CWP	Dodgen	Belleville	Northview	Pearl City	CWP 2	Rustin	Socorro	Kenston	Solon	Stemboost	Slinger	Harvard	Sierra Vista	CWP 3	Eagle View	Kennedy	UMich	Regionals	Springhouse	BirdSO	Menomonie	Troy	Marquette	States	Lexington	Medals
Dynamic Planet	33rd	25th	7th	16th	9th	5th	11th	-	2nd	9th	6th	8th	15th	2nd	2nd	7th	29th	6th	22nd	1st	1st	9th	7th	2nd	2nd	5th	2nd	5th	14
Meteorology	42nd	25th	8th	13th	11th	6th	6th	7th	2nd	-	13th	5th	-	2nd	5th	4th	10th	9th	23rd	1st	1st	6th	3rd	1st	10th	1st	1st	5th	15
Reach for the Stars	14th	12th	15th	8th	11th	5th	5th	-	4th	-	-	-	2nd	-	-	1st	4th	11th	17th	8th	2nd	12th	3rd	1st	2nd	-	-	3rd	11
Water Quality	18th	-	-	6th	11th	2nd	2nd	7th	-	5th	-	-	-	-	-	-	37th	41st	5th	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	5
Team	3	2	2	2	2	2	11	22	1	1	1	1	23	1	1	1	23	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	45
Average	26.75	20.67	10	10.75	10.5	4.5	6	7	2.67	7	14.5	7.5	8.5	2	3.5	4	20	16.75	16.75	3.333	1.33	9	4.33	1.67	4.67	3	1.5	4.33	-

¹: Black went to Lake Braddock and Red went to Pearl City

²: Unstacked, 6th grade partners

³: Part of a next year test lineup with 5th and 6th graders.

2021-2022

Yearly total: 98 medals

Event	UTA	Rickards	Dodgen	Belleville	Troy	Dick Smith	BirdSO (Mini)	SONI	UC Davis	Harvard	Tesla STEM	Sierra Vista	San Marino	BirdSO (Satellite)	Kennedy	Regionals	States	Lexington	NATIONALS	Average	Medals
Bridges	1st	1st	1st	2nd	2nd	1st	N/A	1st	1st	N/A	N/A	2nd	1st	11th3	2nd	1st2	5th2,3	1st	11th3	2.75	15
EWS (Filler)	-	-	-	-	-	-	N/A	-	-	N/A	N/A	-	1st	1st	1st	1st	3rd	2nd4	1st	1.43	7
Green Generation	1st	1st	5th	1st	6th	16th	1st	15th	1st	2nd	1st	1st	1st	1st	2nd	2nd	1st	1st	2nd	3.11	18
Meteorology	1st	1st	1st	1st	3rd	1st	1st	1st	2nd	1st	1st	1st	1st	2nd	1st	1st	1st	1st	1st	1.21	19
Mousetrap	-	-	-	-	3rd	17th1	N/A	1st	1st	N/A	N/A	1st	1st	4th	4th	1st	1st	35th5	5th	6.17	10
Road Scholar	2nd	4th	2nd	1st	-	-	-	-	2nd	-	1st	-	1st	6th	11th	1st	1st	2nd	5th	3	12
Trial Events
Code Analysis	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	4th (solo’d)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	4	1
Digital Structures	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	1st	8th1	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	1st (Official)	1st (Official)	N/A	3rd	2.8	54
Fermi Questions	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	2nd (Solo'd)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	-	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	2	1
Science Quiz Bowl	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	-	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	3rd	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	3	1
Average	1.25	1.75	2.25	1.25	3.5	8.75	1.25	5.2	1.4	1.5	1	1.25	1	4.25	3.5	1.14	1.86	7	4	2.48	89
Overall	1st (41)	1st (40)	2nd (60+0.01)	1st (47)	1st (43)	1st (82)	1st (67)	1st (135)	2nd (50)	1st (44)	1st (42)	1st (51)	1st (42)	2nd (98)	2nd (102)	1st (36)	1st (45)	1st (71)	1st (78)	-	-

¹: Tiered

²: Medal Only

³: Bridge Broke

⁴: Unable to get a gym

⁵: Participation

-Didn't compete in this event

N/A Wasn't run at the tournament

2022-2023

Event	OC Scrimmage	Highlands
Bridges	1st
Fast Facts	1st
Green Generation	1st1
Meteorology	1st
Road Scholar	2nd
Solar System	1st
Average	1.17
Overall	N/A

¹: Allowed time block conflicts to be taken at another time.

-Didn't compete in this event

N/A Wasn't run at the tournament

MYSO and Scioly.org

22th	Gordon received a 22th place trophy at the 2020 MYSO Reach for the Stars Division B.

4th	Gordon received a 4th place trophy at the 2021 MYSO Solar System Division B.

3rd	Gordon received a 3rd place trophy at the 2021 MYSO Rocks and Minerals Division B.

8th	Gordan received a 8th place trophy at the 2022 MYSO Forensics Division B.

1st	Gordon received a 1st place trophy at the 2022 MYSO Green Generation Division B.

1st	Gordon received a 1st place trophy at the 2022 MYSO Green Generation Division C.

Aptdon won "Best Scioly Season" in the 2022 Scioly.org Superlatives.

Aptdon won "Biggest Nerd" in the 2022 Scioly.org Superlatives.

Competition Experiences

2021-2022

UTA

Being Aptdon's first in person competition experience, he absolutely loved it. The night before Texas was quite stressful with him actually breaking his best bridge at the time. Because Aptdon had never even been to an in person competition before this, he had no idea what the experience would be like. The plane ride to Texas was smooth other than the landing which was a slight free fall however to the pilot's credit it was quite windy. This left him very stressed about his bridge, however he continued on with the rest of his trip. He got to see hundreds of bats before the competition as well. The day before competition was quite chaotic being on the UTA campus trying to look for the rooms he would be in the next day. The UTA campus was very large and there was a lot of chaos trying to get from place to place. (The UTA campus was very nice btw) Competition day came with a hard sleep with a music band constantly blaring music the entire night, however Aptdon had a great in person experience. The tests were good and he had a great time. After the awards there is one quote that he particularly remembers from Umaroth, "Too many red" referencing to his one red second place ribbon from road scholar. He swore to redeem himself one day.

Rickards

Rickards was okay on Aptdon's standards. The Green Generation test was above average, however he found the Road Scholar test annoying (as he did for every road test at this point in the year). The Green Gen test was of a good length and had good questions especially for a competition closer to the beginning of the year. However the Meteorology test was last year's severe storms specs It was 50 question multiple choice and they finished the test in 7 minutes.

Dodgen

Dodgen was run quite well with average test quality and good proctors that answered in concise manners except for some funny moments in Meteorology with a lot of caps. He was quite mad however losing to Kennedy by a tiebreaker, and started to do badly in Green Generation so he started to try and pull up his Green Generation score.

Belleville

This was run on the same day as Dodgen, however wasn't run nearly as well. There were no proctors for any of the events present and there were plenty of spelling errors like 'ntaion' and 'ecysostem'. However the largest meme to this day is 'la nino' instead of El Nino or La Nina. The tests were slightly below average however weren't bad tests.

Troy

Aptdon under preformed a lot at Troy. He was distracted in an environment with many of his friends that he hadn't seen for years and let it get to him and stopped his focus. However the tests were above average quality and were great to study from with topics that he had not seen before, and many concepts that were very interesting to study afterwards.

Dick Smith

While this competition did give many difficulties before hand especially with builds, the DSM team worked hard to get us the information and resources needed in the end in a timely manner, so there isn't too much to complain about it. During the tests the Green Generation test was interesting in that it had conflicting information with tests Aptdon had taken before, however the other tests were quite good in their content.

BirdSO (Mini)

This was one of the better run invitationals Aptdon had been to in a month. Even though Aptdon had bad luck at this tournament in the 2020-2021 season involving many bugs with Scilympiad and the weekday format causing issues for him, this year it went much better. The Green Generation test was very good and so was the Meteorology test. He did Digital Structures at this tournament and scored over 2000 points higher than the second place team. In Fermi Questions he achieved a second place while soloing the event.

National Invitational

National Invitational's first time block issues were frustrating, however Aptdon is glad that it was able to be worked out in the end. The original Green Generation test was very good, and the backup test was slightly above average, however miles better than anything he expected for the little time they had. Unfortunately he let the first time block get to his mind and he didn't perform well at Green Generation. In Meteorology he enjoyed the test and thought it was above average with challenging questions, however he believed that there was a bit too much chemistry involved in it. However thanks to his partner carrying in chem they were able to achieve first. Digital Structures went weirdly, Aptdon scored with more than 2100 points higher than the second place team however was placed at 8th place. The only explanation he can think of is an incorrect placement or a tier, however he doesn't know.

UC Davis

UC Davis or Aggie was originally to be an in-person tournament in Northern California, and Aptdon was quite sad to see it switch to virtual because he wanted one more in person experience traveling distances on a plane, however he was fine with the online format. The tests were definitely some of the better one he has seen other than Road Scholar. Meteorology had a nice balance in it's topics and Green Generation was nicely made to have a great balance with the environment and general ecology. The Road Scholar test however is a test that gives him nightmares to this day. Instead of giving Aptdon a "Monroe" Quadrangle from Washington, they gave him a "Monroe" Quadrangle from New York, so he and his partner spent 20 minutes trying to find non-existent places. However with 25 minutes remaining the proctors were able to get the right state, however the map was too recent for some of the questions to be able to be done. Aptdon and his partner were able to recover and was able to score a second despite the issues. He is still annoyed that he tied with Kennedy in Meteorology.

Harvard

Unfortunately unlike the tests he took from the 2020-2021 season from Harvard, the Harvard tests this year were not as high quality compared. The Green Generation test was 27 questions with incredibly broad questions that asked for answers that didn't make much sense in the context of the question. To the current day they still haven't released the Graded Tests. The Meteorology test wasn't terrible.

Tesla STEM

This was one of the best tournaments he had been to in the year. The tests were some of the best he had seen including the Meteorology and Green Generation tests. The proctors knew what they were doing and were very clear on the test. This was one of Aptdon's favorite tournaments. It also had same day awards while keeping a high quality of grading. Aptdon hopes that he may attend Tesla STEM in person in the future.

Sierra Vista

His next in-person invitational since Troy, and Aptdon was determined to bring everything back around from Troy. The tests were very well written in both events and had some of the best tests in the year. He made sure to keep in focus, and here he figured out that solving his infamous very loose Rubik's Cube actually made his stabilization for bridges quite a bit more accurate and better, and also made his offset for mousetrap quicker and more accurate. While studying he spent a majority of his time warming his hands up with it. The invitational was run very smoothly with great tests.

San Marino

This is one of Aptdon's most memorable invitationals. The week after Sierra Vista it was another in-person invitational, even though small in size it had some very high quality tests that he had never seen anything like it before. Studying from the tests was very fun to do with his partner and very interesting to think about logically during the test. At this tournament he achieved a full 6 event 1st place clean sweep in his events, however he was hard carried in EWS. However this is the tournament that he proves Umaroth's "Too much red" and finally achieves his goal. This is an incredibly fun and memorable tournament because of the clean sweep.

BirdSO (Satellite)

BirdSO Satellite was quite well run, however Aptdon's school had issues being able to be on the school campus after school. Otherwise the tests were quite good, however one meme about Carmel Valley's Third team placing first in meteo started within the Meteorology people at Sierra Vista. Aptdon's bridge broke unfortunately and they were not prepared for national level mousetrap.

Kennedy

The Meteorology test was written very well as Aptdon has now learnt to expect when Bananasaurus creates Meteorology test. The Road Scholar test was graded questionably. An above average Green Generation test. Unfortunately in the first run Aptdon's mousetrap hit a chair messing up the runs afterwards.

Regionals

The tests were above Aptdon's expectations for regionals and were decently written. They achieved a score of 0 for mousetrap vehicle and was very satisfying.

States

The tests compared to regionals were slightly worse. The Green Generation test had random questions about topics from other events and the meteorology test was 160 questions. However the road test was above average for many other road tests, and the test writers understood the difficulties of an online road format. States went well for Aptdon in Mousetrap, however in bridges the bridge broke. Aptdon suspects it is because of recent stormy and dry weather in his area causing the wood to contract and expand weakening it. EDIT: Apparently an EXPO marker, two marbles, and some paper had been put into the bridge hopper chute causing the sand pouring to be slower. This is believed to be the cause of the bridge breaking.

Lexington

A great tournament to prepare for Nationals. It had some of the best and highest quality tests seen all season. The tournament was run and Aptdon has no complaints. The Meteorology test written by Bananasaurus was one of the best he has taken the entire year. The Green Generation test was an amazing mix of the broad specs that fit just perfectly and the Road Scholar test was written great for an online format.

Nationals

Overall pretty good tests. No complaints with how it was run other than maybe how the self-scheduled time blocks were setup but worked well enough. Ratings for tests will be more technical than builds.

Bridges

Unfortunately Aptdon's bridge broke despite holding the full weight in a pre-test prior. It was unfortunate however the event supervisor was great and thorough. 10/10

Digital Structures

The event went very well for Aptdon achieving a high score with the case given. Everything worked out correctly and there are no complaints. 10/10

Electric Wright Stuff

Aptdon experienced some difficulties with a phone camera not turning on however was able to get another device for it to work. The flights went well and the system to check planes and test them was systematic and put together well. 10/10

Green Generation

Overall an above average test. Had a great usage of everything on the specs and beyond, however did use terms that Aptdon felt were a bit too broad and away from Green Generation. Some of the questions could have used slightly better wording however around 90% of the questions were great with a good blend of questions. 8.5/10

Meteorology

The test was definitely better than expected. It was able to put together to climactic and meteorology parts of the event together well. It was one of the better Meteorology tests Aptdon has taken with every question making sense, however Aptdon felt that some of the trivia questions might have gotten too outside of the specs and instead would've liked to have seen more theoretical questions that question meteorological knowledge and understanding. 9/10

Mousetrap Vehicle

The proctor was systematic and knew what they were doing. They were patient with us and the event went smoothly. 10/10

Road Scholar

The best Road Scholar test Aptdon has taken all year. The writer understood the issues with an online Road Scholar test format and fixed all of them in a simple and efficient manner. This test made Road Scholar slightly fun to Aptdon again. Amazing Road Scholar test and written so well. The questions were a great mix of calculation and basic Road Scholar principles and the point values for every question made sense to what they should be worth. 10/10

Event Ranting

Some ranting about Science Olympiad events because why not ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Note: The following is personal opinion and is not meant to attack anybody. This is shaped by my own experience however should NOT influence other and is not a fair representation of each event.

Bridges

Despite placing top 2 fairly regularly in bridges, it is a painful event like all of the other balsa structure events. Every bridge that you create gets tested, and then broken and hours of progress are thrown away. Aptdon thought that bridges would be an easy event because he had experience with building bridges before however didn't realize that when Science Olympiad crosses anything in life it becomes a catastrophe. He does respect Jeffrey Trails Middle School for constantly forcing him to keep innovating his bridges. Props to Jeffrey Trails for being such great competitors both in the 2020-2021 and 2021-2022 seasons. Aptdon however does give credit to Balsa Engineering, go check out his YouTube channel here. It inspired him to continue to optimize the design and Aptdon gives a large part of his success to Balsa Engineering.

Digital Structures

While the event is incredibly tedious to prepare for, it slowly becomes fun as you start to get better and understand the event. He regularly gets 4000+ scores at practice and competitions. However logic in Digital Structures is very wonky and Aptdon and his partner get good laughs out of it a lot of the time.

Dynamic Planet

The start of Aptdon's pain, he first enjoyed Dynamic Planet however after taking more Dynamic Planet tests grew to dislike the event. The topic Oceanography is incredibly broad, hence why it is a binder event, however Aptdon just doesn't like binder events in general. Creating a binder is pain and he enjoys the formatting issues that come with cheat sheets. With Dynamic Planet being such a broad event every test was painful with new questions every time. Scores for Dynamic Planet are always incredibly low and cause extreme pain. Fun fact, Aptdon's partner in fact slept in the middle of a Dynamic Planet test because it was so painful to do. Aptdon can believe other Dynamic Planet topics are good, however he will continue to dislike Oceanography.

Electric Wright Stuff

While Aptdon does not build planes or launch them, he is a filler for his partner to help him keep track of time. He enjoys watching the planes however.

Green Generation

Very broad event, however it is fun to study and take tests about. The range of the specs and topics tests can cover is a bit broad for Aptdon's liking and feels slightly like Dynamic Planet except the topics are fun to learn.

Meteorology

Best event, severe storms very fun.

Mousetrap Vehicle

Quite a fun event to run and practice, however national level rules with 5 centimeter increments left the floor looking very dumb and painful to practice. However it is very satisfying to get on dot runs and hours of work paying off.

Reach for the Stars

Aptdon prefers Reach for the Stars over the 2021-2022 solar system topic and enjoyed identification of dso's. Aptdon held first place in star bot ID. He finds the general knowledge fun however did not enjoy the calculation sections.

Road Scholar

In the beginning Aptdon enjoyed having to search through maps for different locations, however slowly started to hate Road Scholar. This is because of the tedious calculations and searching that came with every test. The process of each Road Scholar test was essentially the same thing just on different maps. Having very low quality maps that you can't see a single thing and tests without answer keys did not help either, because then he would have to try and create an answer key which was very painful for him. However as he got more efficient by grudgingly forcing himself to practice Road Scholar, he started to not hate it as he became more efficient at it. He continued to dislike Road Scholar until the UC Davis invitational where it sparked his dislike for Road Scholar again because they gave a map from the incorrect state and didn't give the correct map until 20 minutes left in the test. It was 30 minutes of searching thinking he was dumb because he wasn't able to find the locations they asked for.

Water Quality

One of Aptdon's favorite events, the estuaries topic was very interesting to him and he enjoyed studying it. Only issue he had with the event was when tests asked for what type of estuary some place is and wouldn't specify if they wanted it based on salt content and mixing or geography.

Gordon Name Development

So the way Aptdon's name progressed first started out with a running joke of his coach always putting his name as "Gordan" on multiple lineups after being told the correct spelling. Then another name, "Brandon" came out when Aptdon said that he was his brother named "Brandon" and that Gordan went to high school. This joke actually worked on multiple nerds, and was mainly to stop the Strand 1 nerds from being a crowd. Eventually the name became "Brondan" after many name developments. Then one day when asked what his signature "Name of the Day" was he started out with Brondan but was interrupted by a huge flock of parrots over the school. Yes Sierra Vista during the fall has parrots that are incredibly loud but cool. So then he said Parrots Bombardment. So thus the name Brondan Bombardment was created as his new name. Credits to Sparkly. Soon enough more names were created like Gordanzo Beans, nerd bird, Gordon't, Gorcan't, and many more were created because of his profile picture on discord.

2021-2022 Season Recap

(This is going to be a bit personal because I feel like there's a lot to say)

This season has been incredible. Going into this year I only had plans of doing four events and attempting to do well in them. Never would I have thought that I would end up with seven events at Nationals and placing in six of them. This season has shown me what Science Olympiad really is and is unforgettable. Starting at UTA, I learned the fun and thrill of in-person competitions. After so many repetitive MiniSO tournaments in 2020-2021 UTA helped me get back into the Science Olympiad mindset. Such a tournament at the beginning of the year set the tone for the rest of the year and was so much fun. Getting back to in-person school was also a large thing for me. Before I was always online while other teammates were in person, and it made getting to know them very difficult. This year however Science Olympiad showed me how all these people in this program share a common interest of learning and that this program is very special. I made many new unforgettable friends and memories that will likely persist with me for the rest of my life. I am so proud to be a part of this team, and even more so to say that I was a team co-captain for Sierra Vista. Our team was able to achieve its first Regionals, States, and Nationals Championship in one year. I would not rather be a part of another team in the country. Those who helped along the way including teammates, and coaches like Tim, Josh, and Mr. Evola have helped inspire me to continue even when things don't seem like they can go right. This year showed me what the Science Olympiad community really is, with people all across the country reaching out to help and become friends all through this one program. I have devoted most of my Middle School life to Science Olympiad and I would do it again any day. I will miss this team and the memories this season made. The late night study sessions, the team activities, and the tests taken are truly the best memories of my Middle School life.This season not only closes out Science Olympiad until next year, but almost everything I've worked for in my two short years in Middle School. I wish I had more but unfortunately, I do not. This opens the door to the new generation of young scientists to grow and change the world around us. Connecting with some of my best friends has made Science Olympiad such a great part of my life. I will miss this group of people so much and all of the memories made along the way. Science Olympiad truly is the greatest program.

Acknowledgments

With all of this I would like to give everybody the credit that they deserve. I would not have been able to get through this entire season without these people: Starting with our coaches, Mr. Evola, Tim, and Josh. Our head coach Mr. Evola kept the team running while we were goofing off, continually reminding us why we are in the room and what we are attempting to achieve. He pushed us to get the best out of us and help us learn and grow. Tim was one of my greatest inspirations this year. He is one of the reasons I am standing where I am right now and without the coaching given from him and the example he set for everybody on the team is priceless. Josh was an amazing role model to me. He reminded me that while I have achieved a lot this year that it is important to have a good character and stay humble. Josh helped give me leadership skills and the lessons he taught are irreplaceable. Next we have our ninth grade alumni, Sharon, Ariana, Stanley, Aditya, and Joelle. These individuals helped keep the team going no matter what was happening. They were constantly inspirations to everybody on the team constantly taking initiative. I can say for our entire team that we will miss them next year. Now we have my fellow teammates, Dhruv, Leanna, Pragnya, Shriya, George, Liran, Michael, Ferris, and Daniel. Dhruv and Leanna have become my best friends this season. The experiences shared along the way have been the most memorable of my life and were part of the reason why this year was such a phenomenal one. Watching them continue to work helped keep me going throughout the entire season. While in Science Olympiad they are some of the most hard-working people I know, outside of it they are some of the most intelligent, kind, and understanding people I know. There aren't enough words to describe these individuals and the role they played on me and our team this year. The impact they have had and everybody else is huge. While we will be going to different High Schools I wish to keep in touch with these amazing nerds. Dhruv was my mousetrap vehicle and bridges partner as well and made for an amazing partner who could chip in ideas and help follow through with mine. Leanna had incredible resilience working to get better at WIDI and work on her physics binder. I cannot believe how much effort it took her to make her binder. While things were not going well at times she continued to keep her head up and continue the Science Olympiad way and studied. I could not ask for better friends. Pragnya grinded through Science Olympiad making no progress for one of the longest times. Watching her growth towards the Black team was an inspiring feat. Shriya was put into Crime with almost no time to get ready and study. Watching her get just start studying and eventually medalling in Crime at Nats showed what a great team and how determined our members were. George was an incredibly hard working individual. When things didn't go very well at a competition he got his act together, didn't dwell on it very long, and started back studying. Liran was my Green Generation and Meteorology partner. He is a truly talented person and was an amazing partner for my events. During tests we made room for fun and jokes and kept grinding together every single day. Michael is such a great friend that worked hard the entire year. While faced with many difficulties that made his role difficult to fill he persevered and is a very relatable person. Ferris is an insane individual. He was always one of the first in the room, and one of the last ones out. At 6 or 7 PM at school as I am about ready to go I see him packing up his computer and insane anatomy textbooks, and we both arrived in the room at 8 AM every day ready to get working. Ferris's initiative to constantly get better and to learn was truly an inspiration to me and helped me continue studying. Daniel was my Electric Wright Stuff partner. While I didn't really do much, watching Daniel fly his planes was incredible. He has a great knowledge for aviation and aerodynamics and even though he wasn't in the classroom very often, he was constantly at the gym making tiny improvements to get slightly better. With my team all accounted for I would like to think Peter Hung and the rest of the Nationals event supervisors for running Nationals. This season could not have gone the way it has without them so thank you so much. I would also like to thank every individual that helped every tournament including proctors, test writers, tournament directors, and many more that went unknown on the sidelines. Our team could not have prepared for Nationals without everybody that helped these tournaments no matter how large or small. Lastly I would like to thank everybody else in our program. There are hundreds more students and parents in our program that I did not mention, and they all played a role. Whether it was pushing our Black team to its limits or helping support us with finding resources, they played a major role. Thank you to all competitors no matter where you are from for making this season the way it was. Without all the other schools and students this season would not have been as much fun to compete in. Thank you.

Quotes

"nerd"

"Can you don't"

"BRONDAN BOMBARDMENT"

"save some medals for us"

"just imagine if sv existed but it was just 15 of aptdon"

"We have to nerf aptdon by forcing him to use only one hand"

"gordanzo beans"

"Gordon't"

"Gorcan't"

"Toucan't"

"math doesn't count"

"isnt road scholar like expd"

"ur 102% crazy"

"mousetrap, moosetrap, and goosetrap"

"gorparrot, aptcan, tocdon"

"A species of bird that's also a nerd"

"ur not dead, just unalive"

"Widi [we-die]"

"rod scholar"

"rad scholar, wait no road scholar isn't rad"

"storm the wave, storm the music, storm the crave, storm the sounds, crave the castle, crave the music, crave the sounds, sounds the castle"

"Wait his name is Mr.Evola? I thought it was Mr.Ebola for all of the year"

"nerd bird"

"but even if you don't die you'll still be dead"

"i have 6.9 gfs, one of them is 90% dedicated", "or you have 10, 69% dedicated gfs"

"oh look its [redacted] with his 6.9 gfs"

"ITS THE STEAM KIDS"

"ITS THE JANITOR, GETTEM"

"draw a mustache on his beard"

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