The Academic Decathlon is an enrichment program in which ninth through twelfth grade students compete as individuals and as team members in a series of ten academic tests and demonstrations that are based on an advanced curriculum. Please consider being a judge for the California Academic Decathlon essay completion. 

This competition requires that each team of 9 is composed equally of students with a range of grade point averages, therefore this is not a “straight A” student event. The competition components are art, music, language & literature, social science, science, mathematics, economics, speech, interview and essay.

The teams that have advanced to this round are the best in their county. They will now come together in March to compete for the opportunity to serves as the California representatives at the National competition.  (California is the reigning champion for the last several years!) You can check out our website at http://www.academicdecathlon.org/index.htm

Thanks to the wonders of technology, all decathletes will type their essays utilizing a computer based program and judges will access and score them online. Essays will be made available on March 7th and will need to be scored by March 18th.  The topic for the 2014 Academic Decathlon is World War I.

Each student will be given three prompts to choose from including Language/Literature, Social Science and Science. Judges may specify which topic they feel most comfortable with. Each judge will receive a copy of the prompt, key points, a scoring rubric, and an explanation for the rubric as well as instructions on how to use the website. Each essay will be judged by two judges, with a third judge if there is a gap of more than 200 points out of 1,000 possible.

Again, all you need is internet access. There is no travel involved.

A few hours of your time will make the world of difference in this competition and we will gladly recognize you and your college in our state program and publications.

If you would like to serve as an essay judge, please email Tammy Serpa, Program Specialist, Lake County Office of Education, at tserpa@lakecoe.org with your contact information including name, college and subject area (social science, language/literature or science).