Quiz Bowl Team Shines in Inaugural Season

Displaying impressive rapid-recall to answer questions spanning literature, history, art, science, music, and even complex math, the Northridge Quiz Bowl team romped to a 14-3 season record. They took first place in the Regional level of the state tournament, which they hosted at Northridge, and placed second in another scholastic bowl as well.

The Quiz Bowl team was initially a non-competitive club started a year ago by Juniors Louis Brumwell and Ian Diez, who said, “The complete lack of red tape in trying to start something new really allowed us to just run with it. And the close relationship we have with our teachers made it easy to approach them and ask them to get involved.” This reflects Northridge’s approach of trusting students and encouraging them to lead.

The students recruited Mr. Aric Diamond and Mr. Andre Mendoza as club moderators who quickly recognized the club’s potential, and when the time came last fall, Mr. Diamond entered the now-team into several competitions. Ian and Louis spread the word, new students kept coming to practice, and the number of competitors grew to eight, with many more showing up to practices just for the fun of it.

Entirely self-motivated, the team gets together almost daily during lunch in Mr. Mendoza’s room to run through Quiz Bowl question packets. He noted, “Quiz Bowl is unique because it takes kids that are academically-inclined and plays on that strength, but it gets the competitive spirit up in a way that doesn’t happen in the classroom.” Sophomore Eamon Faherty concurred saying, “Competing in Quiz Bowl is fun because you have to think on the spot. It gets your heart pumping and sometimes, you discover you know things you didn’t even know you knew!” Next year, the team hopes to go all the way and win State!