The Science Olympiad team is almost done with their season, with just their Regional and State competitions left. With the loss of over 10 seniors from the previous season, the team had to fight to not only get more students to join the team but also perform as well as they did before. However, with the help of eight new freshmen and returning members, the team was able to improve upon their old competition scores and dominate in many different events at every competition. Two members who were crucial to the success of the team were freshman Tanya Mittal and Jonah Bourell.
“Putting two freshmen on Gold (varsity) is a little scary because we don’t know their personalities, we don’t know how they work.” Science Olympiad Captain Ananya Singh said. “But we definitely thought that, based on everything we knew about them at the time, that they were going to be a really good fit for [the] Gold team. And I can speak for all the captains, and we say that we’re very pleased with how that decision turned out, and we think that it really worked out.”
Bourell and Mittal are in their fourth year of Science Olympiad, having competed in all three years of middle school. Bourell chose Earth and Life Science events for this season, competing in Dynamic Planet, Ecology, and Geologic Mapping. Mittal focuses on more physics-based events, competing in Forensics, Optics, and Experimental Design. Both students had competed in very similar events in middle school and wanted to compete in events they had experience in.
“[Crave the Wave] was really broad and less specific, and I feel like that gave me a good foundation for optics,” Mittal said. “I’ve been doing physics events a lot. [For] Forensics, I just tried it out in my seventh grade year, and I really liked it, all the hands-on things and the chemistry portions of it.”
Both freshmen have been doing very well at every invitational they have competed in. Mittal placed first in Optics five times and has an average placement of 7.9 out of around 45-50 for all her events throughout the season. Bourell has an average placement of 3.7 for all his events throughout the season, giving him the highest average out of anyone on the Science Olympiad team. At the Regional Competition, they both placed very well, with Bourell placing first, first, and second in Ecology, Dynamic Planet, and Geologic Mapping, and Mittal placing second, second, and third in Optics, Experimental Design, and Forensics respectively. Their high scores helped the Gold team win first place in the Regional Tournament.
“The Northview Invitational was my favorite competition because it was the one I was most consistent at,” Bourell said. He placed second, third, and third in Dynamic Planet, Geologic Mapping, and Ecology, respectively.
Since both students are new to NV Science Olympiad, they had to learn to work with new partners and a harder set of events than at the middle school level. However, thanks to the strong sense of family and work ethic of the team, they were soon able to fit right in.
“The team overall is just much better [than in middle school],” Bourell said. “I definitely have better partners.”
“The team environment is really good,” Mittal said. “When everyone places, everyone is supportive and happy for each other. In middle school, I know that other people were like that, but I was only focused on myself and myself only. But I feel like now that I’ve been on the high school team, I’ve had some really good examples set for me by the captains and everybody in general.”
Along with learning to work with new partners, Bourell and Mittal found other ways to succeed.
“One of the reasons I wasn’t doing well is that I would get really anxious over everything in middle school,” Mittal said. “But I learned how to not stress out and live in the moment. I learned how to trust my abilities and have confidence. Middle school was the growing period, and now I can trust myself to do better. If you’re overly stressed out and not confident during practice, just make sure you are confident.”
“Find what you love to do,” said Bourell.
With the State Competition looming ahead of them, the students have goals for the rest of the season and future seasons. Both Mittal and Bourell hope to do well and place at the State Competition. Bourell aims to keep up his streak of receiving medals at states and hopes to win five more before the end of his senior year to make a total of 10 state medals won.
Both students look forward to their state competition at the end of April.
