AMHS After Dark: Meet the Raptor Academic Team

An Inside Look at the Academic Magnet Academic Team and What It’s Like to be at AMHS After Dark

Ella Sanders, Staff Writer|March 9, 2023

Academic Magnet’s very own Academic Team is a quiz bowl competition where students compete to showcase their knowledge on a variety of academic subjects. Competitions consist of teams of five going buzzer-to-buzzer with another team. Our Academic Magnet Academic Team consists of 28 Raptors who practice every Thursday 3:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. to prepare for the Jeopardy-like competition. They utilize Protobowl, a digital program that allows for real-time multiplayer quizbowl questions and competition. The team has been practicing since second quarter and competing in matches since third quarter. Matches run from 6:00 p.m. to 7:45 p.m. on Thursdays. The team is usually at the school well after dark, enjoying 8 p.m. pizza dinners and team bonding. The team is coached by Ms. Etikerentse and Ms. Vann.

Ms. Etikerentse is a veteran of Academic Team coaching and says her favorite part of coaching is “to see just how little I know compared to the kids.” Category-wise, Ms. Etikerentse is very knowledgable about current events, ancient history, pop culture, and general social science questions. Ms. Etikerentse loves watching the Raptors on the team showcase their knowledge and admits that occasionally “I don’t even know the answers to the questions so it makes me very proud of the kids when they know the information. It gives me hope that the kids are informed, educated and passionate about knowledge.”

Ms. Vann enjoys coaching Academic Team and says that it is the “closest I’ll be to being on Jeopardy.” She loves coaching and says that “it’s just amazing how much random stuff they know and it’s fun to see them thrive and succeed and celebrate when they get the answers right. They pretty much run themselves. They set up practices and facilitate the whole thing.” Ms Vann says that she enjoys watching the games and loves “how much fun they have with it. I expected it to be a little more serious, but there’s more of a sense of camaraderie.” She described the Magnet Academic Team as exciting and having a “certain vibe that makes people want to do it.”

Team Captain Moyu Yamaguchi (12) is excited to be leading during her fourth year on the Academic Team. She specializes in science and likes “being able to interact with students from different grade levels.” She first joined at the urging of her mentor, Molly Tippey, and has made many fond memories during her years on the team. Her favorite memory from this season was when the team “tricked Vishwa into thinking we lost against Wando.” Looking ahead to the future, Moyu reflects that “one thing I probably will miss about the Academic Team is surprisingly the inter-school rivalry with James Island. I felt that the teams were more intimate in the sense that we all knew the coach and everyone on the other team and they probably knew a lot of people on our team. And then we’re literally only inches apart during matches so things would get heated pretty quickly.” Moyu also loves the team and how, “after the games we would all get together and tell each other what irked us during the match and it’s funny to see how everyone had the same idea during the game without any conversation.”

The Academic Team is composed of mostly juniors, so I found it necessary to sit down with some juniors on the team to get the inside scoop.

Kabir Zaman (11) specializes in history and current events. One of his favorite memories of the season was when the team was “getting destroyed by Wando, so in the lightning rounds we couldn’t have won even if we got every question right, and Wando switched out their team while we kept our strongest team in. The second topic was History of India, and Vishwa and I looked at and fist bumped each other.”

Junior Jessie Ross specializes in literature and science. According to Jessie, “I did quiz bowl in middle school. I’ve always liked trivia and found it fun.”

Scarlet Rutter (11) has spent two years on the Academic Team and specializes in fine arts. Scarlet enjoys answering questions, citing that it is “pretty fun and easy to get excited when you know the answer to a question.”

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“Jessie invests more time into practice than anyone else”

— Scarlet Rutter (11)

Julia Gulledge (11) specializes in science and religion. A funny memory she looks back on is when there was a “lightning round about sports, but none of us knew any of the sports questions.” Despite this, the other team lost points because one of their players “kept buzzing in wrong answers.”

When asked what it’s like to be on the AMHS campus after dark, Julia described it as being “very odd.” Kabir described it as having a “very different ambiance during normal hours.” According to these juniors, the school afterhours can be quite boisterous during matches, and affords underclassmen the opportunity to go in the senior lounge under the cover of darkness.

Notable moments from this season include a teacher from an opposing team telling an enthusiastic Magnet player to, “Chill your Adderall!” with the player revealing in the aftermath of this incident that “I’m not even on Adderall.”

These juniors collectively listed a player from Wando as their biggest rival, describing him as the “strongest player in the state,” someone who “carries the entire team by himself,” and who is also “Vishwa’s childhood friend.” Intimidating.

So far this season, the Academic Team has beat West Ashley, SOA, Stall, Wando, and James Island (some of them twice).

The Academic Team’ first face-off with Wando. Photo credit: Ms. Vann

Finals are March 16, 2023 at Cooper River Center for Advanced Studies and are open to the public. Come out and support the AMHS Academic Team!

Address:

1088 E Montague Ave, North Charleston, SC 29405

I have it on good word that Cooper River Center for Advanced Studies has a really nice competition room, so this is definitely a series of matches you don’t want to miss!

Roster:

Captain: Moyu Yamaguchi (12)

Tina Liu (12)

Vishwa Veeraswamy (12)

Maysen Ronchetto (12)

Kabir Zaman (11)

Scarlet Rutter (11)

Maria Rutter (11)

Jessie Ross (11)

John McQueen (11)

Julia Gulledge (11)

Colin George (11)