Dunbar’s academic team competed in the Kentucky Governor’s Cup that ended in Louisville on Monday. The Governor’s Cup includes all teams in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and teams must win at the District and Regional levels in order to compete. Dunbar’s Quick Recall Team was the state runner-up and the Future Problem Solving team came in fourth place. Dunbar was the second-place overall team.

Sai Naidu is a sophomore who is on the Future Problem Solving team.

“I enjoy competition because it stretches my mind; we have to figure out creative solutions,” she said. “Challenging yourself and knowing more than you did before is amazing. The thrill of getting questions right makes it enjoyable.”

Naidu likes competition, but she loves to win.

“When you come together with your team to win and you hear ‘Dunbar’ called, it’s such an exhilarating experience. Getting to go up there and shake the governor’s hand makes you feel so good because you’re contributing to the team,” she said.

Aside from team competitions, there were also individual, written categories. The categories included five subject areas as well as written composition, and while Dunbar’s team was successful in the team categories, they did even better individually.

Alice Li, Athena Kern, Kathleen Yang, Valerie Sarge, Chloe Cao and Neelav Dutta are all Dunbar students who placed in individual categories ranging from Arts and Humanities to Math and Science.

Kern, a senior, is part of the Quizbowl team. Kern placed third in Language Arts and fourth in Arts and Humanities.

“I enjoy learning about the different topics and cultures,” she said.

Sophomore Joanna Slusarewicz agreed with Kern.

“Competition provides a wonderful opportunity to learn about a vast array of topics. I got to compete on the future problem solving team, which involves the creation of new ideas,” she said.

The team members are overall pleased with the results from the competition, but no one is prouder than their coach, Ms. Susan Magedanz, who has been coaching for 12 years.

“My favorite part of coaching is getting to work with some of the most amazing people around on a daily basis,” she said. “I am always proud to be associated with young women and men of this echelon.”