The Knowledge Bowl Team from Bayfield High School will take the national stage today.
The team is participating in a 150-team national competition, the National Academic Quiz Tournaments' Small School National Championship Tournament in Chicago.
This will be Bayfield's first time attending the Small School National Championship Tournament.
Competing in the traditional public school division will be Captain Collin Jackson, with teammates Andrew Stumpf, A.J. Swenk, and Rock Wageman.
They are coached by Roxanne Henderson. Being able to compete in a division against other small schools "really evens the playing field for our kiddos," Henderson wrote in an email.
Quiz bowl is an academic competition for teams of four students. Quiz bowl teams use buzzers to answer questions about science, math, history, literature, mythology, geography, social science, current events, sports, and popular culture.
The matches feature a blend of individual competition and team collaboration, since no individual player is likely to be an expert in all subject areas. Participation in quiz bowl both reinforces lessons from the classroom and encourages players to develop new intellectual interests.
This tournament is the only quiz bowl national championship pitting small schools against each other, according to a press release from the organization.
It has one division containing non-selective public schools with 500 or fewer students in their top three grades, and another division for other schools with 350 or fewer students in their top three grades.
Last year's tournament featured 96 public-school teams and 30 charter- and private-school teams from across the United States. Glasgow High School from Kentucky won the public-school championship, and St. Mark's School of Dallas won the charter- and private-school title.
Tournament results will be updated throughout the three days of competition at http://www.naqt.com/stats/tournament-teams.jsp?tournament_id=8402 so everyone can follow along and see how the team does. Twitter users also can follow the tournament at #ssnct.
