SPECIAL TO THE REPORTER

Pelham High School students love competition, and the Scholars Bowl is one way students can learn and be competitive at the same time, according to Brianna Radcliff of the Pelham High School newspaper.

For the past three years, teacher Penny Benington has sponsored the Scholars Bowl teams.

&8220;It&8217;s the best group to sponsor at PHS. They are so motivated to succeed,&8221; said Benington. She said her favorite thing about Scholars Bowl is that each team has a great sense of humor and a strong competitive spirit.

Sophomore Erica Batty joined Scholars Bowl this year. &8220;I decided to join because I love trivia and game shows like Jeopardy,&8221; she said.

Sophomore Will English has been on Scholars Bowl since the sixth grade, and was on the PHS varsity team as a freshman. He is now the captain of the JV squad. Batty and English both said doing crossword puzzles helped with learning new information. The crosswords make them look more for information and study things they usually wouldn&8217;t.

Senior Anthony Vacca has been on Scholars Bowl for three years. He joined Scholars Bowl because he wanted to participate more in school, and last year he was captain of the junior varsity team. He hopes to be the captain of the varsity team this year when they choose leadership roles.

The teams meet every Tuesday and Wednesday for an hour. They have several resources of questions to practice for Scholars Bowl. &8220;The teams show quite a bit of enthusiasm as they try to beat one another to answer the questions,&8221; said Benington. During the practices they hook up the buzzers and practice for tournaments.

Each member chooses one area of expertise such as science, math, mythology, sports, pop culture and works of literature. Once they have picked their category, the students learn more about it and study for tournaments.

There are two Scholars Bowl teams, a varsity and junior varsity team. Though they are currently broken up by grades, as the year goes on the teams will divide up by skill.

Scholars Bowl&8217;s first tournament was at Hoover on Oct. 14. The scholars attend local competitions at schools like Hoover High and Alabama School of Fine Arts, but they will also go on to Montgomery and Tuscaloosa soon. They compete for Shelby County and District wins in February.