By Andrew Lovdahl

Gargoyle staff reporter


Posted Tuesday, April 17, 2007, The OG, news & student awards

AFTER SWEEPING THE competition at the sectional level of the Worldwide Youth in Science and Engineering Academic Challenge on March 8, Uni is, yet again, bound for the state finals.

This year's WYSE team is aiming for the school's 10th consecutive state title.
However, the previous nine wins were all in the “300” division (300 students or fewer); this year, Uni will compete in Division 700 (schools with enrollment between 300 and 700).

Uni will be pitted against such academic heavyweights as University of Chicago Laboratory High School, which has won first place in the division six times in the last seven years.

The Division 700 finals will take place Wednesday at the Illini Union.

“Winning state is obviously fun also, but it was never a challenge in 300,” says team sponsor James Carrubba, Uni's physics teacher. “I am more nervous and excited now than I have ever been [about] WYSE.”

So how does he rate Uni's chances in the new division?

“It depends on how hard people have been studying,” he says. “Everyone at Uni is so ridiculously busy that you can't expect everyone to make WYSE the focus of their lives.”

The WYSE competition consists of tests in English, biology, chemistry, computer science, engineering graphics, mathematics, and physics.

The level of difficulty increases as students progress through the three stages of competition: regionals, sectionals, and finals.

Competing schools are split into divisions based chiefly on school enrollment: 300 or fewer students, 300-700 students, 700-1,500 students, and 1,500 or more students.

Because Uni has a small enrollment but incongruously high test scores, it cannot fairly compete with other small schools at the regional and sectional level. Instead, Uni competes at the “unlimited” level (1500 or more students) in the regional and sectional rounds. Uni was the only “unlimited” school in this year's regional round, held at Parkland College on Feb. 8, and consequently scored a perfect 500.

At sectionals one month later, Uni once again scored 500 despite notable competition from Danville High School, which scored 420 points and finished ahead of Uni in the biology category.

A total of 10 schools from Uni's sectional (Eastern Illinois University) advanced to the state level from four divisions, including Danville and Champaign Centennial, which was the second-highest scoring institution. (Centennial participated in Division 1500). More than 30 schools representing five regionals competed at the EIU sectional.

Of the 18 students on Uni's WYSE team, 14 finished third or higher in at least one category at sectionals: Robert Boyce, Alex Cahill, Ian Chen, Christine Cheng, Luke Chiang, Aria Collopy, Benjamin Fu, Daisy Hassani, Ben Hyman, Chandra Pathuri, Jennifer Roloff, Benjamin Schaap, Marquis Wang, and Victoria Wang.

Additionally, Boyce, Cahill, Cheng, Chiang, Marquis Wang, and Victoria Wang all placed in the top three of two different categories.

Carrubba has, with the assistance of chemistry teacher David Bergandine, been sponsoring Uni's WYSE team for about five years.

“It is extremely fun,” he says. “Charleston [home of Eastern Illinois University] is a blast every year, and helps add to my ever-burgeoning collection of anecdotes.”

So any final thoughts heading into Wednesday's competition?

“Our chances at getting into the top three in state are, I think, very, very good,” Carrubba concludes. “We will see.”

RELATED

— Background: Worldwide Youth in Science and Engineering

— Background: WYSE Academic Challenge

— Gargoyle coverage (2007): WYSE team cruises through sectionals, ready for state

— Gargoyle coverage (2007): Uni begins road to 10th straight WYSE state title

— Gargoyle coverage (2006): Uni wins ninth consecutive WYSE state title

— Gargoyle coverage (2006): Uni seeks ninth consecutive WYSE state title