The WYSE Team at Marquette Catholic High School in Alton, shown here, finished in second place at the state finals of the Worldwide Youth in Science and Engineering Challenge April 14 at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.

The Marquette WYSE Team advanced to the WYSE state finals academic challenge held at the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, on April 14 and finished second overall out of over 20 teams competing in their division (based on enrollment). The team was able to advance to the state finals after having won first place at both regional and sectional competitions held earlier this winter.

Marquette's team included seniors Christian Vitali, Drew Schwartz, Corey Marin, Stephanee Hughes, Larry Newquist, Andrew Korte, Chris Kratschmer and Dan McFarlane; and juniors Sam Ruesing, Alex Smith, Morra Dwyer, Pat Fitzgerald, Nick Walters and Travis Zuellig. Pat Bauer, a math teacher at Marquette, is the coach of the team.

The WYSE Academic Challenge is a competitive series of tests created and administered by Worldwide Youth in Science and Engineering and offered to high school students in Illinois and Missouri. Test material is drawn from senior high school and freshman level college curricula. Subjects include biology, chemistry, math, physics, computer science, engineering graphics and English, and are of increasing levels of difficulty at regional, sectionals and then state finals.

Each student must compete in two subject areas and can advance as an individual or as a team, after having won either first or second place in their division. They have 40 minutes to complete multiple-choice tests that range in length from 30 questions (computer science) to 100 questions (English).

Individual medal winners at state include; Sam Ruesing, first in chemistry; Alex Smith, third in chemistry; and Morra Dwyer and Pat Fitzgerald, both fourth in chemistry.