The Academic Decathlon team has ended its season early due to team membership losses, according sponsor Wendy Gerardot via email. The team had planned to attend its regional competition in Fort Wayne, but had to drop out as a result.

“We were to go to Fort Wayne this weekend for the Regional competition. Unfortunately, we had some people drop out at the last minute. Those losses put our team numbers below the minimum needed to compete as a team and thus potentially qualify for state,” Gerardot said. “Due to the costs the school would incur to send the few remaining members to (Fort Wayne) to compete individually, we had to opt to cancel the the trip all together.”

Co-president and senior Michael Luo said that the members who backed out were unable to attend due to the SAT test date.

“We’ve encountered these problems a lot in the past, but we’ve always been able to avoid it, but this time there was nothing we could do because the SAT is such a big test,” Luo said.

Despite this setback, Gerardot also said that they are already looking ahead and that preparations for next year’s team will begin in May. Luo said that he also looks forward to next year’s team.

“I’ve been happy to have been able to participate in Academic Decathlon these past four years, but since I won’t be here next year, I can only advise the sponsors and help choose somebody to take my place. The freshman and underclassmen have a lot of ability to come back next year and win, so hopefully in the future, these tests won’t conflict with our competition days,” Luo said. By Andy Yang <[email protected]>