While the freezing temperatures the weekend of January 6 kept many people indoors and in the warmth of their own homes, students from Oakton went to Fairfax High School for the Virginia Science Olympiad Invitational.

This begs the question, what is Science Olympiad, and what does it mean to attend an invitational?

Science Olympiad is a club with a goal of increasing science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) participation for students Kindergarten through 12th grade. Tournaments are held throughout the year, in topics ranging from astronomy to forensics to hovercrafts to rocks and minerals. At Oakton, the club is large, and broken into three different teams.

At the invitational, people competed in a wide range of events. Events require various skill sets, including building, coding for something, working in a lab, creating a Rube Goldberg machine, or even taking a test to demonstrate knowledge on different topics. Senior Claire Tracey participated in three “study events”, taking the test for anatomy and physiology, respiratory microbe emissions, and herpetology (the study of reptiles and amphibians). There were many options of which tests to take, but Tracey decided to take tests that were more biology-oriented, playing to her strengths after she took AP Biology last year.

In her tests this invitational, Tracey placed for the regionals invitational, but did have some difficulties with the animal calls in herpetology. “It was hard to identify, given picture of organism and flip through notes to identify it and answer questions about its habitat,” said Tracey. “We were not expecting that, because even on practice tests I hadn’t seen it, and other people who had participated in the Herpetology event before didn’t have to recognize animal sounds,” she remarked. To prepare for the competitions, Tracey has found that people that have participated in the competitions previously are some of the best resources, but online there are also many available sources.

While Science Olympiad is very focused on allowing students to learn more about various STEM programs and participating in competitions, there is also a teamwork aspect. Oakton has three teams, and at competitions teams can get trophies. Teams can get trophies by having the most members rank well within their respective competitions. “By having a teammate, I’m more motivated to work hard,” said Tracey. Tracey and Bethany Gedzelman (12) competed together at the invitational, and will continue to work in tandem moving to the regionals level.

While Tracey is just one of many Oakton students a part of the Science Olympiad club at Oakton, the club would be a good fit for anyone with an interest in STEM. As someone who enjoyed science in middle school and decided to join Science Olympiad, Tracey stated that the club is a good fit for, “anyone who has an interest in the STEM fields- it doesn’t matter if it’s biology, or physics, or chemistry, or animals or something else because there is really something for everyone if you enjoy any part of those classes.”

Looking forward, Science Olympiad has regionals on January 26. Only the top 15 students from each school qualify for regionals. Oakton’s Science Olympiad has competed in two invitationals up until this point, one this past at Fairfax High School and the prior one in December at Virginia Tech. While it may be too late to join Science Olympiad this year, everyone can still support Science Olympiad as the Oakton students compete and continue to learn in preparation.