L.A. UNIFIED & L.A. COUNTY ACADEMIC DECATHLON WINNERS ANNOUNCED

by Nicole Santa Cruz | LA Times/LA Now

February 11, 2010 |  9:06 pm -- Marshall High School beat out 64 schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District in the annual Academic Decathlon, district officials announced Thursday night.

Anastasya Lloyd-Damnjanovic was the highest scoring individual student, with 8,933 points. 

The second-placed school was El  Camino Real and the third was Granada Hills Charter High School.

The decathlon tests students’ knowledge in a variety of areas, such as history, speech and interviews. This year's focus was the French Revolution.

Members of Marshall High School’s winning Academic Decathlon team include: Un Sil “Cherry” Park, Brandon Schwartz, Anastasya Lloyd-Damnjanovic, Andrew Dang, Alejandra Cardenas, Kittinan Ponkaew, Liliana Delaguila, Amber Esponda and Marcos Chinchilla. Their coach is Larry Welch.

Marshall High School first won a national championship in 1987.

Since then, the district has won 15 state and 10 national competitions. 
West High School of Torrance won the Los Angeles County Academic Decathlon for the second year in a row, county officials announced Thursday afternoon.

The top-scoring individual student was Jordan Smolinsky of West High, who scored 8,525 points.

The second-place school was Keppel High, followed by Torrance High in third place.

Members of West High School’s winning Academic Decathlon team include Aaron Cheng, Chris Miro, Patrick Xiao, Joey Hahm,  Hussein Nasr, Jordan Smolinsky, Kevin Gupta, Jeffrey Ho and Joon Park.
Their coach is Ann Cortina. 

The winners now head to Sacramento to compete in the state competition March 12 -15. The top-scoring school will go to the nationals to be held April 21-24 in Omaha.