After qualifying for Nationals, the quiz bowl has continued Tuesday practices after-school and included more challenging questions, according to advisor Peter Dangerfield.

“We’re not really doing anything out of the ordinary due to the format of nationals, which is extremely similar to the format of tournaments we’ve been doing all year,” Dangerfield said. “Because the format is the same, we can practice the same. The questions will get harder — the nationals packet is harder than the normal packet.”

According to junior captain Danny Hunegs, practices for Nationals helps the team familiarize themselves with the content.

“It helps us because in quiz bowl there won’t be the same questions, but it’ll be the same topics, so just listening to those old questions makes you think ‘oh this has been asked a lot,’” Hunegs said. “Also, it just helps us a lot to get into game shape, like what to expect and what to do.”

Junior Anil Pillay said practicing helps players broaden their knowledge of the various topics on which they will be asked questions.

“It really helps us because we get more well-rounded, like some of our groups are good at specific things. We just keep running through questions on history, literature and science, we are all able to run through those questions,” Pillay said.

Hunegs said because of the cost of Nationals, the team is looking to make money through fundraising in the community.

“We’re also doing a lot of fundraising, because going to Atlanta isn’t cheap. We’re planning on having a Chipotle fundraiser or Blaze, also have some other fundraiser and maybe a parent night sort of thing or friends in the community can come and play and pay for their teams,” Hunegs said.

According to Dangerfield, the teams qualify for Nationals by placing in specific brackets of the competitions.

“Throughout one of the several sanctioned tournaments that are held in the area each year, if you have a team that places in the top 50% then you can qualify a team. If a school has two teams in the top 50%, they can have two teams qualify,” Dangerfield said.

According to Hunegs, Nationals will take place May 26, 27 and 28 in Atlanta Georgia.