Recently, the JROTC Academic Team competed at a competition at East Hamilton High School. The CHS JROTC Academic Team had 2 separate teams it competed in. In this competition there were many schools. Out of all of those schools the team placed 6th. This was a decent result for the team according to the coach, Major Spencer.

Major Spencer has been the Academic Team coach for 6 years and has seen the team place high and low. When asked how he felt the team did he responded, “I only sat in a couple B team meets and they did good and everyone was contributing to the team, but some members weren’t following the rules but thankfully were not penalized. Team 1 did good with using subs, but there should be more positivity in the team. I think we should have more competitions for teams to compete and learn. People need to actually study their areas they are assigned. We need to go more into geography, literature, and history.”

First year team member Cadet Private Alex Vaillancourt responded, “The teams did well.”

Second year team member Cadet Corporal Kamryn Forehand said, “I believe the team did well this year. We persevered and found ways to work together and do the best we could do. We might now have won, but the fact that all of us-together-wanted to do the best we could do, that’s way more important. It’s rare nowadays to find teams who get along both during and outside of practices and competitions, so the fact that there was a level of camaraderie between everyone made things all the better.”

Third year team member Cadet Captain Alan Castillo said, “I think the team performed well, team 1 advanced to day 2 and team 2 although they got eliminated still won one round.”

No team is perfect and has a weakness. Major Spencer said the team lacked confidence and camaraderie. He explained, “We need to work on the teams having the same purpose, same goal and camaraderie. The teams also need to work on having more confidence.”

Similarly,C/CPT Castillo mentioned that a big weakness was a lack of confidence. He answered, “The team’s biggest weakness I think was just shyness and not answering even though they knew the answer.”

C/PVT Vaillancourt answered, “The lack of knowledge we had on English and some history events.”

C/CPL Forehand responded, “Subject-wise, I believe literature was the biggest weakness, especially on day two. It’s a hard subject to study for, and so many books or works throughout the centuries have a chance of being mentioned. In general, however, I think the team occasionally lacked motivation. It’s easy to slack off, so I think it should be worked on.”

With every weakness comes the opportunity to improve on it. Major Spencer responded with, “We need to get a hold of the study material that is used so we can study more. Try to host a one on one competition against other schools. Get to know other academic coaches.”

Cadets Forehand and Vaillancourt both mentioned that additional studying could benefit the team massively.

C/CPL Forehand said, “If the team focused more on studying, we could do much better next year. Despite being given ample study material, the actual time put into studying was low. Making study days mandatory or even encouraging teammates to learn more about their subjects outside of team practices would greatly help.” C/PVT Vaillancourt added, “Reading more would help a lot.”

C/CPT Castillo explained, “What could be done to improve next year is getting our teams to step out of comfort zones and improving confidence.”

Major Spencer said, “I just think there is a little more we can do. Especially with our JPA inspection coming up it has set us off track a little bit.”

C/PVT Vaillancourt added, “The team was really fun and a good experience.”

C/CPL Forehand explained, “I truly did. Academic Team is one of my favorite things to be a part of, and I had a lot of fun this year. Being around others who you feel comfortable with is a priority, and I think everyone did a wonderful job this year of accepting others and making practices enjoyable. Even during competition, there was a noticeable chemistry between teammates; we were able to communicate given the circumstances and that single factor led to us getting several questions right.”

C/CPT Castillo agreed. “I personally enjoyed being on the team.”