Redondo Union High School Advances To State Academic Decathlon

REDONDO BEACH, CA – Redondo Union High School's academic decathlon team is advancing to the state competition next month with a total score of 43,929 out of a possible 60,000 points, it was announced last week.

West High School in Torrance was named the winner of the Los Angeles County Academic Decathlon, with a score of 54,459 points to top the list of competitors.

Redondo Union High School, along with six other teams in the competition, scored high enough to earn wild-card berths in the state contest, which will be held March 22-24 in Sacramento.

In addition to RUHS and West High, the Los Angeles County teams advancing to the state contest, along with their scores, are:

• Mark Keppel (Alhambra), 52,823;
• Beverly Hills, 52,373;
• Edgewood (West Covina), 45,657;
• Rosemead, 44,559;
• El Rancho (Pico Rivera), 43,948; and
• Palos Verdes Peninsula, 43,123

Nearly 400 students from 50 teams participated in the county decathlon, which focused on "The 1960s: A Transformational Decade."

The top individual scorer was West High's Kendall Kirio, who scored 9,259 out of a possible 10,000 points.

The winner of the state competition will advance to the U.S. Academic Decathlon taking place in Bloomington, Minnesota, in April.

The winner of the Los Angeles Unified School District Academic Decathlon, which is held separately from the county, is expected to be announced Saturday. LAUSD schools have won the national championship the last eight years in a row -- six times by Granada Hills Charter High School and twice by El Camino Real Charter High School, which won last year and in 2014.

Those two schools, however, did not compete in the LAUSD Academic Decathlon this year. According to the district, the schools opted to compete in the Southern California Private Schools event due to uncertainty stemming from the January LAUSD teachers' strike.

Granada Hills Charter High School has won the national competition six of the last seven years, interrupted only in 2014, when another LAUSD school, El Camino Real, won the title.

City News Service contributed to this post; Image via Shutterstock