Knowledge Bowl: In the Know

KENNEWICK - Four contestants each from Prescott, DeSales and Connell high schools sat at round tables in the lobby of the South Hills Church in Ken- newick last Wednesday. In front of them was a metallic strip wired to a box near the moderator who sat across from the players.

She fired off a question:

"Name the Egyptian president who was assassinated by extremists in 1981 for ne- gotiating peace with Israel."

Several students slapped their hands on the strip to make the buzzer go off and signal that they might have the answer, or figured they could come up with it before it was their turn. The first one to get it right got the score.

But in this case, the right answer on the Middle East history question from three decades ago was not forth- coming, and finally one student joked, "King Tut." Laughter erupted from the tables at the mention of the famous pharaoh whose mummy was entombed sev- eral millennia before 20thcentury politics.

The moderator shook her head. After none of the teams, whose members were all born long after the Camp David Peace Accords, got it right, she decided to share the answer and move on.

"Anwar Sadat."

While the 12 players sweated over the question, 27 other teams from Waits- burg, Dayton and a dozen other high schools in the region (many schools field two or more teams) were spread out elsewhere in the sprawling church building. They faced similar questions as unpredictable and topically varied as any subject the students may or may not have learned in their life- long school careers.

Welcome to Knowledge Bowl, an intense scholastic competition that requires stamina from only one body part: the brain.

"It's fun, but it's challeng- ing," said Emily Wilson, who competed on the Prescott team at the Kennewick meet along with Gabe Escalante, Dalton Larue, Tasha Gonza- lez, Catherine Martinez and Claudia Soriano.

Every year, teams from the Touchet Valley partici- pate in this season-long "think-off" equivalent of high school sports competition, and in recent years teams from Waitsburg and Dayton have made it to the state meet. Last year, the Cardinals placed fifth in their 2B class. This year's meet will take place in Arlington.

The Kennewick meet was among the largest gatherings for intellectual jocks this sea­son. Six cerebral "athletes" from Prescott, eight from Waitsburg and nine from Dayton bused over to the Tri Cities together for the event that sharpened their skills for the regional Knowledge Bowl and possibly beyond.

The next regional Knowl­edge Bowl event is sched­uled in Waitsburg on Feb. 25, and district competition between Waitsburg, Dayton and DeSales is expected to be fierce. Prescott is in a 1B faceoff with Pomeroy.

At the Kennewick meet, Waitsburg's A team tied for third place with Prosser's top team, behind Hanford and Richland. Dayton's top team placed 18th and Prescott's only team ended up 29th. DeSales' premier group placed sixth.

"We've been pretty even this year," Waitsburg Knowl­edge Bowl coach Brad Green said about the performances from district rivals Waits­burg, Dayton and DeSales. "Waitsburg has come out on top but not by much."

Waitsburg's team in­cludes Emma Philbrook, EJ Meserve, Meara Baker, Hannah Grant, Alex Leath­ers, Chad Pearson, Thibault Martinelle, Cherry Dai, Bar­clay

Donohue, Leighton Dorman and Catherine She­perd.

Dayton's Knowledge Bowl coordinator Doug Yenney said his team, which also went to state last year but didn't place, lost two of its best players to Running Start. The competing Bull­dogs include Guy Spalinger, Grant Heinrich, Ian Smay, Kane Hackett and at least half-a-dozen other students this year.

"The kids have learned a lot and have garnered a lot of useful knowledge," Yenney said. "It's a chance for them to demonstrate they know stuff, show their talent and be in a place with like-minded kids." It's an opportunity for students who aren't necessarily athletic to shine, he said.

And have some fun, Prescott Social Studies teacher and coordinator Jeff Foertsch added. "The kids have a good time."

The Jeopardy-style oral contest with the buzzer is one of two Knowledge Bowl competitions. The other is a set of written questions the teams poured over for an hour before meeting the other teams face to face at the buzzer tables.

That "quiz" also cov­ered the waterfront, with questions about European composers, natural resourc­es, Civil War battles, gov­ernment, biology, marine geography, paleontology, American literature, math, astronomy, physics, gram­mar and even First Aid.