Little more than one month ago, Quiz Bowl members attracted 15 new players to their first meeting. This jump in membership was just the first sign of what is turning out to be a great season for Quiz Bowl, according to Carmen Garland.

    Garland, the club’s adviser and a social studies teacher at Park, said she is pleased with the team’s early success.

    “We have a league competition every Thursday and Team A is undefeated,” Garland said. “They’re all pretty ambitious, and I’m happy with how well they’ve been doing.”

Team A, Park’s highest ranking trivia team, competed at a meet at Rosemount High School in addition to its own conference’s league. It finished fourth out of 60 teams at the meet, which qualified it to compete at a national tournament in Chicago.

Simon Fruchtman, one of the lead scorers for Team A, said he believes the team succeeds due to its unique, laid back attitude.

“I think that part of the reason we’ve been doing well is because we’re not that nerdy,” Fruchtman said. “We don’t take ourselves too seriously, we just kind of have fun with it. It makes the game a lot less stressful and more fun and we’re a better team because of that.”

Garland agreed with Fruchtman and said the members of team A have an aptitude for the game.

“They’re good across a wide variety of topics and they buzz in fast,” Garland said. “If they continue to do well in their own league and make it to the championships, they would be poised to do quite well at the state meet in February.”

Fruchtman views Quiz Bowl as an opportunity for learning, not just winning.

“We hope to do well in upcoming tournaments, but if we lose to the teams that learn for the sake of Quiz Bowl rather than for the sake of learning we won’t be upset at all,” Fruchtman said. “Ultimately the goal is to enjoy yourself. While winning can be fun, when you set really high standards that ruins the fun aspect of it.”