Jake just finished another season of Science Olympiad, competing on the homeschool team, Learning Vine. They are a team of nine, competing against all the area mega-high schools, like Naperville North, Nequa, IMSA, and Libertyville. It’s akin to David going up against Goliath!

The Learning Vine team had t-shirts made with this quote on the back: “There are two types of people in this world: Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data” This is very very funny if you are a scientist. It’s a little annoying if you are a grammar buff.

How do they compete? The only equipment necessary, for the most part, are pencils and brains. They enter a classroom with this equipment and take a written test.

A couple weeks ago, they participated in the regional competition at IMSA, where the competition is intense because kids have been studying and researching their topics for months.

Jake and his friend Sam placed second in Astronomy (right behind Metea Valley…ouch). They were very excited.

Speaking of Metea Valley, there was a bit of an awkward moment when Jake walked in to take his compound machine test, and the administrator was his Physics teacher from Metea. Umm…hi, Mr. B. It was all good though, Mr. B wasn’t surprised to see Jake. Probably most awkward for Jake’s mother.

Jake came away with a couple more medals, and overall, the team rocked. Not only did they win the Spirit Award for team with the best attitude (politeness to test administrators, etc.), out of 24 high schools, Learning Vine came in 9th, just two places away from making it to the state competition!