Seize The Day!

Maclay Takes Middle and Upper School Latin Students to the 77th Annual FJCL State Competition

Photo by Adeline Allen / Maclay Andalusian

Any competition at the state level is a chance for students to truly showcase their talents. For Maclay’s Junior Classical League (JCL), it was an opportunity to display their Greek and Roman knowledge. On April 8-11, Middle and Upper School students made the journey to Orlando for the 77th annual competition. On Wednesday, students were tasked with park rides and fun at Universal Studios, a stress-free time before the academic testing began. The following day, Middle and Upper Schoolers alike spent the day studying for their various tests and quiz bowls.

 “I am very competitive, so I love the challenge that the other competitors at state bring,” sophomore Genevieve Lemmon said. “I also really enjoy being with friends who also like Latin.” 

On Thursday night, competitors traded uniforms for togas to celebrate the Opening Ceremonies and the first round of certamen, a quiz-bowl featuring questions on Greek and Roman topics. 

“At regionals we usually have a chance at placing [at certamen], but at state it is pretty much us just trying to steal as many questions as we can from the really good teams,” Lemmon said. “It is really hard to beat any of the good teams because they spend a lot of their time practicing and have really committed players who are  dedicated to their teams.”

The certamen rounds continued late through the night and onto the following day. Maclay’s intermediate team, composed of freshmen and sophomores, took 9th place at finals.  

“My favorite academic part of the forum is certamen,” junior Lauren Conn said. “I love to see what kind of Latin literature questions I get to answer, and I feel very proud when I answer them correctly!”

Friday morning sees nervous test takers bright and early. Almost everyone at the competition lined up to take a test in many unique categories, from mythology to derivatives. For those only competing in one test category, there are artistic elements to the competition as well. 

“There is definitely an element of chance in both the creatives and academics for JCL,”  Lemmon said. “The place you get for your creative is entirely up to the judges, as art is very subjective. As for the academics, it is virtually impossible to memorize everything you could be asked, but if you learn and memorize as much as you can about your academic tests, your chance of placing well  is much higher than in creatives” 

Overall, it was an extremely successful trip for the Maclay Latin Teams, with Middle School placing fourth at the sweepstakes and Upper School placing 12th. Countless numbers of students took home trophies, medals and memories galore.