Hendrickson High School's UIL Academic team recently made waves at the UIL Regionals competition. The team was recognized for their outstanding performance and awarded the Overall Academic Sweepstakes Runner-Up. This is the best the school has ever done at the Regional Meet in terms of overall academic sweeps.
The team's performance was exceptional, missing out on the top spot by just three points. Senior Lucas Flores won the title of Regional Champion in both Informative Speaking and Lincoln Douglas Debate. Freshman Hannah Saad also made her mark, earning the Regional Champion title in her first trip to UIL Regionals. Hendrickson also took the title of Regional Champion Speech Team, beating the nearest competitor by a whopping 25 points.
The team's success was not limited to those events alone, as they also took the Runner-Up title in both Literary Criticism and Current Events. The Literary Criticism team, composed of Hannah, Neha, JC Haub, and Simon Alvarez, put up a strong showing. Similarly, the Current Events team, which was composed of Shauri, Cecilia, Rin, and Hoan Nguyen, displayed impressive skills and knowledge.
Lucas, Hannah, Maya Haye, Kate, and Cecilia are set to compete in the UIL State competition in May, with the other finalists traveling as alternates.
Other students with individual placings which added to the overall points total were Kaitlyn Nash placing 6th in Ready Writing and 4th in Informative Speaking, Lili Moran placing 6th in Headline Writing, Natalia Zavaleta placing 6th in Feature Writing, Addi Villegas placing 6th in Prose Interpretation, Shauri Yedavalli placing 5th in Current Events, Cecilia Acosta and Aidan Cheely placing 3rd and 5th in Persuasive Speaking respectively. Other students competing at regionals were Helia Nguyen, Hadley Wimmer, Rachel Arrowood, Isabella Gangle, Campbell Wright, Meredith Cook, Ava Lambert, Heaven Kouakou, Jasper Johst, An Dinh, Katie White, Tyler Marchese, Victor Bendixen, Nosa Osakue, and Sreehari Nair.
Congratulations to the entire team and best of luck to those heading to UIL State!
