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The Coppell High School Academic Decathlon team (AcDec) has soared through this year’s regional competition to the state tournament in El Paso this month. As one of the highest achieving teams to exist at CHS in recent years, the team represents the brilliance and commitment of Coppell students.

“It has been such an honor to make it this far,” co-captain junior Jahnavi Udaikumar said. “We have worked so hard to achieve this and everyone deserves it.”

The AcDec team is currently ranked 10^th in state and 23^rd in the nation.

“We have the ability and talent to compete at the national level,” AcDec coach Tim Dixon said. “The only problem we have is that CHS kids are so involved in other activities and travel internationally. We have a lot of team members leave during the summer and holiday break.”

Photo Courtesy of Blunk's Photography. The 2011 AcDec team has advanced further into the competition series than any other team CHS since 2006.

Despite the varying interests and commitments of the team members, their dedication to the team was proven during the five-day snow break, preventing them from attending school and practicing traditionally.

“We studied everyday over the snow break,” Dixon said. “The team is connected to web based software that allows us to compete on inter-squad scrimmages and national scrimmages. The snow days gave us a chance to finally push out all distractions and really focus on some of the support material we have.”

The team is divided into three groups of competitors; A, B and C average students. These students compete at competition against other students, who have similar grade averages, but they are tested on the same topics as students of other averages. Each year, the AcDec team is faced with a specific topic that they are forced to study in an in-depth manor, in addition to the general content. This year, the topic is ‘Great Depression.’

“The topic of the year is always our biggest challenge,” Udaikumar said. “Most of us have seen the general info in years past, but the new content is what we have to work on the most.”

The 2010-11 AcDec team will be the first to compete at a state level since the 2006 team who placed third in the competition.

“We have had good team commitment,” Dixon said. “I still think asking kids to come in everyday after school to study for two hours after they just spent eight hours in school sounds crazy. They also come in every other Saturday for six hours. It has been a challenge to get the team to realize their potential – I feel they are the most talented in the state.”

Video by Aleya Noor

They practice daily during the school day, two days after school and a majority of Saturday. They prepare in order to compete against a series of schools from around the area. Their excellence brings esteem to the school, just as any other Coppell team. And now, with the advancement from regionals to the state round of competition, the CHS Academic Decathlon team proves to provide yet another mark of distinction to the high school.

Official sendoff to the AcDec team took place on Thursday, Feb. 25 during first period, as the competitive team headed off towards their meet in San Jacinto College in Houston. The team is set to prepare in all 10 categories – the essay and speech on Friday, and the rest on Saturday.

Each year, the team is assigned a certain topic over which to study several different aspects of – such as music, art, history, language, etc. – in order to later compete in academically based tests. Beyond just written examinations, oral demonstration and impromptu speeches over the subject have the ability to appear. This year, the topic chosen to be studied was the French Revolution.

“I’m in French already and love the country, so I was pleased to be studying about a topic that I was already fascinated with,” junior Kelsey Dreier said. “Through this year, I’ve learned so much more than I ever could have imagined about the revolution.”

Though the fourth period class has roughly 25 students enrolled, only a certain number of them could qualify to be on competitive “A”, “B” and “C” teams. Those remaining members either fill in as an alternate, or are part of the support group.  

“We help the competitive team by making PowerPoint’s and Jeopardy games to help them study,” support group member sophomore Priya Gupta said. “We’re basically their cheerleaders and their coaches mixed into one.”

Despite the multiple practices that team members must attend, additional studying outside of school is required as well in order for students to hone their skills as much as possible. Placing the highest at regionals that they have in years, the AcDec team is now prepared to go to state and compete against 40 other teams. The best team out of all will advance to finals in April.

“We’ve all worked very hard for this,” sponsor Donnette Alexander said. “It’s been months of intense preparation. This year’s team has worked well, with a lot of team spirit – they’re all very supportive and competitive at the same time.”

In the case that the team does not advance to finals, preparations for the remainder of the year have been made.

“We know that next year’s topic will be the Great Depression,” Alexander said. “So we can begin to prepare next year’s member for that topic ahead of time.”

A “survivor night” took place on Feb. 19 in order for the team to create its poster and a last minute preparation. Lasting from 6 p.m. to midnight, AcDec students spent the night playing games in order to prepare for their competition as well as form a closer bond as a whole.

Despite the outcome of the event, the team resolves to continue working hard in order to prepare for whatever future event might occur.

“People just assume that you have to be a super nerd to be in AcDec,” junior co-captain historian Tina Gutierrez said. “But really, all types of GPAs and personalities are welcome here. Being on the team has really made me realize the importance of collaboration and how many different types of people there are.”