Sitting in the classroom under the dim lights, they organize their supplies, making sure they have everything they need. The proctor hands out their tests, making sure that they don’t peek at them yet. Finally, it’s time to begin, and they quickly flip over their tests and begin writing.

UIL academics has competed at four invitational meets over the past few months. They competed at Cedar Ridge, Round Rock, Hays/Hendrickson and Westwood. The school won first in the academic sweepstakes at Cedar Ridge and Westwood. 

“It definitely feels great as a school [to have done so well],” UIL coordinator Josh Marsh said. “It just goes to show the prowess of our students at Cedar Park and their dedication to UIL academics. Many of our students have been competing for multiple years, and it shows the pride that our students have in our campus and the pride we have in academics here at our school.”

Senior Parker Huang competed in mathematics, number sense, computer science, science and calculator applications at the Cedar Ridge and Westwood invitationals. He has competed in UIL academics all four years of high school.

“I started doing UIL because I had done similar competitions in elementary school and felt like I was pretty decent at it,” Huang said. “I didn’t do anything like that in middle school, but once I got to high school and discovered how similar UIL academics was to what I had done in the past, I decided that I should probably do it.”

At Cedar Ridge, Huang placed first in calculator applications and mathematics, fourth in computer science and fifth in number sense. At Westwood, he placed first in calculator applications and mathematics, third in number sense and sixth in science, and he tied for fifth in computer science. Last year, he advanced to regionals in all of the events he competed in.

“I added computer science last year [to my schedule] and just started science this year,” Huang said. “I felt like I did pretty well at those new events at the invitationals. Last year, when I advanced to regionals, the most exciting part was the number of people who advanced alongside me. We were able to take the entire team, which I was really happy about. I’m expecting to make it back to regionals this year because I’ve made it the past few years.”

Huang is one of the official captains of the team and said that he enjoys the academic rigor of competing in UIL academics.

“[My favorite part of UIL academics] is learning new things that I either wouldn’t necessarily learn in my normal classes or that I would just skim over in my classes to get a good grade on the test then forget about it later. It allows me to remember the things I’ve learned throughout high school which is definitely good.”

Senior Kenzie Vo competes in the UIL spelling and vocabulary event. Vo has competed since her freshman year.

“As a kid, I did a lot of spelling bees which is really what prompted me to join UIL spelling,” Vo said. “It’s very different from those spelling bees but it still has the same level of knowledge and background. It’s really fun to use all of the knowledge that I have [in the competition].”

For spelling and vocabulary, competitors get a list of 1,500 words beforehand, then during the test, they are quizzed on the spellings and meanings of many of those words. Many of the words on the list originate from other languages.

“It’s so fun to see all of the different cultures and origins of the words and how they fit together,” Vo said. “There’s so many French words this year, and last year, there were a lot of Latin words on the list, which is cool because I didn’t know a lot of them [before I started UIL spelling].”

Vo competed at every invitational this year and won first place at all of them. She advanced to state last year.

“It was so rewarding [to advance to state],” Vo said. “It’s an amazing experience to be able to accomplish something individually because my team didn’t get to go, so it was just me. It was so amazing to go and meet so many new people. I still have people that I talked to there that live four or five hours away, but we still keep in touch.”

Vo said that she recommends joining UIL and that she enjoys it. 

“It’s a test, so many people think it’s just an extension of school, but it’s really not,” Vo said. “It allows you to pursue your passions that you love deeper. I’m not going to [major in] English but it’s definitely been a great hobby.”

Senior Alyssa Fox competes in UIL journalism, which comprises five events–news writing, feature writing, headline writing, editorial writing and copy editing. Fox competes in every event but copy editing. 

“My favorite part of UIL is getting to hang out with everyone.,” Fox said. “I get to hang out with all of my friends, and it’s so fun. I even hang out with people who aren’t competing in journalism because I have friends in science, spelling and all those other events. It’s so fun to be in that space with everyone and nerd out.”

Fox competed at state last year and placed fourth in news writing. At the invitationals, she placed multiple times in the top six.

“This year, I want revenge at [the state meet],” Fox said. “Even though I placed, I don’t feel like I did my best because I was dealing with some stuff. I typically have some overthinking that happens at district, then I only go to region in a few events. I just want to trust myself this year because I know what I’m doing, and I’m really good at it. I’m looking forward to hopefully advancing all the way and getting a bigger medal.”

Fox said the invitationals are a nice place to teach less experienced teammates and learn from each other before districts.

“[My biggest advice for new competitors] is just to trust yourself,” Fox said. “Whether you have Hert, Marsh, Brannan or someone else as your coach, they’re really good at telling you how to do everything and all of the strategies you need. I was scared to join at first because I was worried that I would be bad at it or not like it. I think just taking that leap of faith and being like ‘I’ll go to this invitational and do really good at it’ will likely lead to you finding out you’re pretty successful at it.”

Next up for the UIL team is district on March 29 at CPHS. The team won the district championship last year by over 100 points and hopes to win again for the fourth consecutive year. 

“[We] always have a continual turnover [in our program],” Marsh said. “As kids graduate, we always have kids coming up that will be successful. As one program is not super successful, the other programs have been picking it up. So we’ve always had that continued success, and we’ve been having success for the past five or so years.”