MSMS physics students traveled to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, Saturday to compete in the annual University of Alabama High School Physics Contest. The contest is open to high schools in Alabama and surrounding states. The MSMS team represented the school with several individual and group awards.

To prepare for the competition, the students completed practice problems both individually and as a team. The contest itself consisted of timed individual written tests and ciphering tests. The individual test has 32 multiple choice questions (no calculator) and one free response question used in the event of a tie.

Ciphering is a team test in which the four team members answer 16 questions individually to gain points for their team. In addition, the university gives a four-year in-state tuition scholarship to the top two scorers in the written exam if they choose to attend the University of Alabama.

Junior Steven Chung stated, “Ciphering was difficult to say the least; however, it was so much fun. I really did rediscover my love of Physics during this competition as well as throughout the entire competition, and I will surely do it again next year.”

In addition to academic tests, the university even provided a question and answer panel with experienced physicists. Following the panel, there was a presentation on angular momentum using a spinning wheel, a flaming waveform, and a van de Graaff generator.

Out of 400 high schoolers, three MSMS students placed in the top 10 (awards are listed below). Andy Zhao, winner of 2nd place on the individual test as well as the subsequent scholarship from Alabama University, stated, “The event was overall fun and very cool. The one awkward part was the fact that everyone was congratulating me on the scholarship to Alabama and how that was awesome. However, I was just thinking of how I am already going to another college the entire time, and the guilt just overtook for me for a few minutes. Other than that, the competition was really amazing!”

Awards:

Individual Tests:

2nd – Andy Zhao

5th – Gary Nguyen

10th – Leah Pettit

Ciphering:

1st – Magnet School Division – MSMS Team A (Emily Hook, Uriah Jenkins, Jenny Nguyen, and Maggie Ford)