The Academic Decathlon team traveled to Drake University recently to compete in the annual Iowa Academic Decathlon.

The decathlon is broken up into small schools and large schools within two divisions. The large schools consist of all 4A school systems, while the small schools are divided from 3A to 1A schools all in the same division.

"It is quite a tall task for our kids," said sponser Bret Ruggles, "but they competed well and we finished near the top for small schools in the state of Iowa. There were several great scorers from the day in our three categories of students."

In academic decathons, there are three divisions: honors, scholastic and varsity.

Honors team members include Trina Restauro, Eian Adams and Carlone McAlexander with alternates Sam Schaefer and Hannah Jackson.

The scholastic team consists of Alex Young and Sam Crawford.P>The varisty team has one member - Lew Knapp.

Here are the top eight finishers for the Drake regional from Mount Ayr:

Speech - Lew Knapp (Varsity), Sam Crawford (Scholastic)

Music - Caroline McAlexander (Honors), Alex Young (Scholastic) and Lew Knapp (Varsity)

Mathematics - Lew Knapp (Varsity)

Literature - Caroline McAlexander (Scholastic)

Placing in the top three among the alternates were Sam Schaefer in literature, economics, science, art, math and music and Hannah Jackson in social studies, mathematics, literature, music and science.

Photograph courtesy of Mount Ayr Record-News
Transcription by Sharon R. Becker, August of 2016