Laguna Hills High Places 2nd in Academic Decathlon

Laguna Hills High School placed second in the 17th annual California Academic Decathlon on Sunday, and five students on the school’s team won individual awards and scholarships in the contest that pitted 41 schools in the state against one another.

In winning second at the two-day competition held in Fresno, Laguna Hills received 48,419 points out of a possible 60,000. El Camino Real High School from the Los Angeles Unified School District, which won first place, beat Laguna Hills by 820 points.

El Camino Real will go on to represent the state in the U.S. Academic Decathlon next month in Atlanta.

On Saturday, the nine-member Laguna Hills team won the Super Quiz, which this year covered issues and history of the United Nations.

Each team had nine students who were selected based on their grade point averages, attitude, and teacher recommendations, among other qualifications.

Students on the Laguna Hills team are Khanh Bui, Heather Rambert, Eric Girma, Frank Yu, Jeff Skinner, Ippei Tanaka, Blake Lynch, Jamie Mann and Andrew Ting.

Girma, Yu, Lynch, Mann and Ting won various medals and cash scholarships for their individual performances. The scholarships will go toward their university of choice.

Laguna Hills “always [has] a very good, competitive team,” said Judy Combs, executive director of the Academic Decathlon, a two-day competition which was held at Cal State Fresno. “They have outstanding coaches. . . . Actually, the coaching there is almost a labor of love.”

The decathlon consisted of 10 events, including written and oral competitions ranging from science to fine arts to economics.

Laguna Hills High has represented Orange County for the last eight years, winning the state titles in 1990 and 1991.