KATY MAGAZINE NEWS
February 24, 2019
It’s a first for Katy Independent School District! This year a total of six high school teams will be headed to the Texas Academic Decathlon Event to be held on March 8-9 in San Antonio, TX.
Click for slideshow - Courtesy of Katy ISD
Heading to State
The District has the most schools heading to State of all the districts competing at the 5A Large Schools Division level. Katy, Morton Ranch, Taylor, Cinco Ranch, Seven Lakes and Tompkins high schools will each be sending a team of nine students to compete.
Advanced Academics
“Participating in decathlon team activities provides our Katy ISD students the opportunity to experience the challenges of high level academic tasks. It also promotes a sense of team effort to accomplish academic excellence,” said Alene Lindley, Director of the Katy ISD Secondary Curriculum, Gifted and Talented (GT) and Advanced Academics Department.
Regional Academic Decathlon
Two weeks ago, the six teams participated in the Regional Academic Decathlon at Seven Lakes High School where they obtained the needed cumulative points to move onto the next level.
The curriculum, provided by the United States Academic Decathlon (USAD), changes each year and includes roughly 1,000 pages of high-level curriculum covering Math, Music, Economics, Science, Literature, Art and Social Studies. Students also have to prepare and deliver a memorized speech and give an impromptu presentation. Additionally, they also have to sit in an interview and write an essay.
Opportunities of $150,000 in scholarship money
The Texas Academic Decathlon Event is the second largest academic program in the nation where students have the opportunity to be one of the beneficiaries of $150,000 in scholarship. The top scoring teams will head to the United States Academic Decathlon competition to be held in Bloomington, Minnesota from April 25-27.