A group of students enter a room. The desks are lined up with four desks on each side and a moderator at the end. The A team is about to play their first playoff game in the IQBL Kickoff. Their opponents are Northwest A who have won every game they played thus far. The City team’s coach pulls them aside just before the game starts. He stresses to them that they must not be afraid. For now on nothing matters only the game. They won that game.
“Quiz Bowl is an academic competition,” Club sponsor, Carson Tuttle said. ”Our team here at City High travels to other schools and competes against other teams to answer academic questions.”
The Quiz Bowl team attended a competition in Wakee,Iowa on October 25th.The City A team won four games and lost 3 placing 4th in the tournament. They had practiced every week to prepare for this competition. But this wasn’t anything new—Tuttle has been running quiz Bowl for four years..
“I had a friend of mine from Illinois who {was} a Quiz Bowl coach,” Tuttle said. “He saw how much I love trivia and I loved being a part of our team and he came to me and said, ‘hey, I think you should think about starting a Quiz Bowl team where you’re teaching.’”
When his friend approached him, he considered starting a team, but he didn’t immediately act. The idea resurfaced about six months later because of some students he had for American studies.
“I had a couple of students in my 8th-grade American studies class, Jethro Michaelson and Daniel Drolette,” Tuttle said. “ I came to [them] with this idea to start this Quiz Bowl team at Southeast, and it really took off.”
With support from some of his students, Tuttle launched a Quiz Bowl team, which soon began to gain traction as it grew from fielding one team its first year to being able to regularly muster four teams. Soon after the club was founded, the team began winning its first competitions.
“We were able to be really competitive in these competitions really quickly,” Tuttle said. “So once that happened, I realized that the goal shifted to become ‘let’s create a positive community,’ but also ‘let’s go out and accomplish a goal together.’”
Due to the team’s victory in the Quiz Bowl state competition and unexpected nationals qualification, the team was able to focus increased energy on creating a tight-knit community while remaining competitive. The team was able to compete at a high level almost immediately. The quiz Bowl team is still quite active.
“Hopefully we’re going to go to Nationals this year in Atlanta, Georgia,” Felix Cook ’28, a club member, said. “I’ve been looking forward to that for a while and obviously there is State this year [and] …several smaller tournaments coming up”.
The Quiz Bowl team has a full schedule this year, with many tournaments that they plan to participate in. The team is still, however, open to new participants.
“Quiz Bowl meets Wednesdays [from] 4:15 to 5:15,” Felix said. “It’s very simple to join. Just walk in the [the library] and you’ll be greeted with lots of friendly faces of a great community and a fun activity to do.”
