Caption: Coach Lima checks to make sure the answer to one of the Knowledge Bowl questions is correct. [by Micah Greve]
By Micah Greve
Pan American Christian Academy (PACA), is preparing to send six high school students to compete in a Knowledge Bowl Tournament that will be held at the OLM high school in Rio de Janeiro during the last week of September from the 30th of September to the 2nd of October.
The six diligent students who are traveling to the tournament with their coach and Mr. Renato Sousa are: Rafael Oliveira, Luke Meier, and Leonardo Tamashiro (from 12th grade), Matheus Steinberg (from 11th grade), and Lucas Steinberg and Arthur Lobato (from tenth grade).
In the past few years, PACA has participated in other Knowledge Bowl tournaments and has gone to lots of places, including Recife, Curitiba, Rio de Janeiro, and Brasilia (twice).
Mr. Guilherme Lima, one of the art teachers at PACA, is also the Knowledge Bowl coach for middle school and high school. He also said the team had gone to Santiago, Chile in the past.
“We have three seniors on our team, who have gone to tournaments in the past,” said Lima. “New players are bringing different perspectives and dynamics to the squad. Arthur Lobato was on the Middle School team that won it all a couple of years ago at EABH.”
Mr. Lima is ready to take on the challenge of this tournament and hopes that the team will make it to the final four. Even if they don’t win or get a good place, he is still confident that they will have fun.
“Traveling with the team is always a blast, and every moment is to be cherished,” he said.
Sophomore Arthur Lobato got his first experience as a Knowledge Bowl contestant when he went to the competition in Brasilia with the middle school team. Now that he is the high school team, he is working with an entirely new group of teammates.
“From what I’ve seen in practice I have no reason to not be confident in my teammates,” said Lobato.
From his experience in traveling to Brasilia, he likes being in the company of friends and hanging out with them. He is looking forward to time spent with his teammates both in the competitions and when they have free time. But he is not a fan of traveling and going out to places.
Coach Lima agrees with this mindset by saying that winning the tournament isn’t the only reason for traveling. He also sees the value of time spent together no matter what place they get in.
The team has been having practices every week for the past year to start getting ready for the tournament. The people that were chosen are the people who have answered the most questions right during the practices.
They will be traveling by plane to Rio de Janeiro and will stay at a hotel on the nights between the tournament days. During the day they will be at the host school, OLM, to play against the other international AASB schools in Brazil. When there aren’t any games, they are hoping to visit famous tourist locations in the city, such as the mountain known as “Pão de Açucar” or go down to one of the beaches.
The team and coach are excited to travel and participate in the tournament. PACA will be cheering for this team so that they can have a good time and hopefully come back with a trophy.
