Best And Brightest: North Hollywood High Boasts Nation's Top-Ranking Academic Teams
NORTH HOLLYWOOD (CBSLA.com) — It's an accomplishment for a high school to have one academic team make the championships.
But three? That's an honor earned by several hard-working students at North Hollywood High School headed for competitions that could change their lives.
Three teams will represent the school at the National Science Bowl, the Academic Decathlon and the Cyber Patriot Nationals.
"It's just hard work. Just like an athletic team, it doesn't happen by accident: there's dedication, there's work, there's good coaching. Our teachers are doing a wonderful job," North Hollywood High Principal Richard Rosales said.
The Academic Decathlon team is gearing up for the state championships in Sacramento.
"Math, literature, science, social science, art, music, economics..." decathlon member Abigail Ibarrola said of the subjects she and her peers are expected to study rigorously.
"There is a lot of hard work and studying that goes into it. Other than that, it's just a routine of sitting down and preparing and studying, and doing that constantly," decathlon member Gabrielle Galvin said.
The Cyber Patriots team won Nationals last year and hope to repeat their success at the competition later this month. They hope to go on some day to protect the public from cyber theft.
"Stay true to our fundamental basics, our techniques and strategies that we used in the competition last year and all of this year, and I think we'll be fine," Cyber Patriot team member Travis Raser said.
Banners and trophies are peppered throughout Room 202, where the Science Bowl team train. Past students have been accepted to universities such as Harvard, MIT, Caltech and Stanford.
"The Science Bowl is, not to be cliche, but one of the things I look forward to when I get up. It's exciting," Science Bowl team member Edmund Oh said.
For these students, it's crunch time. There are only a few weeks left until they perform in their respective competitions and they're hoping to bring more trophies home to North Hollywood High.
