Boca Raton Community High School

Boca Raton Community High School, commonly shortened to Boca Raton High School or Boca High, is a Division C school located in Boca Raton, Florida. They placed first at their regional tournament and the Florida state tournament for many years in a row, until the 2018 season, where they received a second place at both competitions. Nevertheless, they have attended the National competition since 2010 and have been increasing their scores at the invitational over time. The school's website can be found here.

History
The team was started in the late 2000's, meaning that the team is around 10 years old. During 2009, it attended the Southeast Florida regional, in which it scored 1st, starting a nine-year streak where the team earned a first place medal at the regional tournament. At the state competition, the team scored 6th place, meaning that they would not go to the national tournament. In 2010, the team scored 2nd at the regional tournament, which allowed it to continue to the state tournament, in which it scored 2nd. Due to the second placing, the team was allowed to attend the 2010 Nationals competition, one of the first national-level competitions the team had attended. They would not preform too well, with a 51st place, but they would start a general decreasing trend in their placing.

In 2011, Boca Raton Community High School won its regional, which moved them on to the state competition. There, they won their first state-level Science Olympiad competition, which they would continue to do for the next 6 years before 2018.

From 2012 to 2017, the team received first places at both the regional and state competitions. Their Nationals score was slowly increasing, leading up to its peak at the 2017 Nationals competition with a 12th place. In this period, Archimedean Upper Conservatory, a school from Miami, Florida, would begin to emerge as a serious competitor, earning a second place at the regional tournament for many years in a row. Both schools fought fiercely for the first place title, and Boca High ended up gaining it for many years in a row.

2018 was not the best year for the team, marking the first time they scored 2nd place at the regional-level and state-level competitions in several years, losing to Archimedean. These placings broke long streaks Boca High had at the regional and state competition it attended. Additionally, they broke their slowly increasing Nationals score with a 27th place.

Invitationals
Boca Raton began to attend invitationals in 2015, starting with the MIT Invitational, where they brought both Team 1 and Team 2. They also decided to also attend the Cypress Falls Invitational the same year with Team 1 only. They found relatively good success at these invitationals, including placing 4th overall at Cypress Falls. These were the only 2 invitational competitions that the team attended in 2015. Since 2015, the team has consistently attended the MIT Invitational, however, the team has not attended Cypress Falls since their visit in 2015.

In 2016, the team chose to attend the Cornell Invitational, along with the MIT Invitational. They brought both Team 1 and Team 2 to both invitationals. While neither team was able to place at the MIT Invitational, Team 1 placed 3rd overall at the Cornell Invitational. It appears that the team did not think too poorly of the Cornell Invitational, attending again in 2018.

In 2017, Boca Raton tried the Golden Gate Invitational with Team 1, along with taking both teams to the MIT Invitational as usual. Team 1 placed 6th overall at the Golden Gate Invitational, but neither team placed at the MIT Invitational again. Like Cornell, the team appeared to enjoy the Golden Gate Invitational, since it returned in 2019. However, getting to the Golden Gate Invitational can be quite a hassle for the team, since it is located in California, almost all the way across the country.

In 2018, the team attended 4 invitationals for the first time. This included bringing Team 1 to the Northview Invitational and the Princeton Invitational for the first time, as well. Both teams were taken to MIT and Cornell. Even though this was not the team's best year, Team 1 did manage to place 6th overall at the Cornell Invitational.

In 2019, the team attended 4 invitationals again. This year, they tried the Penn Invitational, taking both teams. Boca Raton was very good at the invitationals it attended, with Team 1 placing at all invitationals. The placements earned by Team 1 included three 2nd places (Northview, MIT, and Golden Gate) and one 6th place (Penn).

Team Setup
The team is coach-run with high stress on equality among members. The majority of preparation is done during after-school gatherings in the coach's classroom on weekdays. Over the weekends, students may meet up together to review their events, including some student-led gatherings at a nearby university.

The entire program consists of 5 teams:


 * Team 1 is the team that attends every tournament, including all invitationals, the regional tournament, state tournament, and national tournament.
 * Team 2 is considered a good introductory team for those new to Science Olympiad and hope to advance in the future. This teams attends some invitationals, as well as the regional tournament and state tournament.
 * Teams 3, 4, and 5 are the teams that often only attend regionals, but if a team does well at the regional tournament then they may attend the state-level competition.

The placement of students on teams is determined mainly by their scores on placement exams that occur usually around the middle to end of September. While these are the main factor, other factors play into the decision as well, such as the events the student is interested in and how often they come after school. It is frequent for students to move up and down teams over the years based on their performance, however, most students do not move during the year unless something severe has happened on a team.

In previous seasons, Teams 3, 4, and 5 were named after colors instead of numbers in order to make the teams appear more equal.

Breaking Records
The school's Team 1 and Team 2 broke the Florida States Competition record, for being the first school to attain both 1st and 2nd place rankings at the 2015 States competition in the Florida Science Olympiad history. However, 3rd place Archimedean Upper Conservatory won 2nd place by default, and went to the 2015 National competition in place of Boca High's Team 2.

Boca Raton had a breakthrough performance at the 2017 Nationals placing 12th from 20th the previous year and decreasing their point total by ~100.

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