Photo of 4 students celebrating after winning Quiz Bowl

By Cindy Horchem, CJE, Ph.D, JEA business and projects coordinator

The spring 2022 Quiz Bowl trophy is headed to Torrey Pines High School in San Diego. TPHS defeated Lawrence (Kansas) High School in the championship round of the National Journalism Quiz Bowl April 9 at the JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in Los Angeles.

This is the third time a Torrey Pines team has won Quiz Bowl with previous victories in 2016 and 2017.

The winning team featured four students representing the TPHS Falconer, senior Jasmine Criqui and juniors Cole Frost, Michele Kim and Jerry Wu. Their adviser is Mia Boardman Smith.

The popular Quiz Bowl competition returned as part of the first in-person convention since fall 2019.

“This has been such a great experience,” Kim said. “We all studied different aspects of the material, and we’re so excited that it paid off.”

TPHS team members congratulated the Lawrence team on making the finals a great match.

Lawrence team members were Kenna McNally, Perrin Coulter, Jack Ritter and Finn Lotton-Barker. Their adviser is Barbara Tholen, MJE.

To determine the initial seeding, 21 teams of four students took a qualifying test April 8. The teams represented 15 schools. 

The next day, the top 16 qualifying teams met for four rapid-fire buzzer rounds, answering questions pertaining to current events, journalism law and terminology, and civics. The team that scored the highest of 10 questions proceeded to the next round, and for the final round, the winner had to score the highest out of 20 questions.

Teams advancing to the finals were:

  • Archbishop Riordan High School, San Francisco
  • Castle View High School, Castle Rock, Colorado
  • Daniel Pearl Magnet High School, Lake Balboa, California
  • Dos Pueblos High School, Goleta, California
  • El Camino Real Charter High School, Team 1, Woodland Hills, California
  • Lafayette High School, Wildwood, Missouri
  • Lawrence High School, Lawrence, Kansas
  • Liberty High School, Lake St. Louis, Missouri
  • Monta Vista High School, Cupertino, California
  • The Harker School, San Jose, California
  • Torrey Pines HS, San Diego
  • Walnut Hills High School, Team 2, Cincinnati, Ohio
  • West Linn High School, Team 1, West Linn, Oregon
  • West Linn High School, Team 2,  West Linn, Oregon
  • Westlake High School, Team 2, Austin, Texas
  • Westlake High School, Team 3, Austin, Texas

Lindsay Porter

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