User:John Richardsim

Hello, my name is John Richardsim. I am going into 9th grade at Grand Haven High School, and will be (and have been) participating in division B for Lakeshore Middle School. As you will see below, I mainly participate in study events.

6th Grade (2012)
I only participated in two events in 6th grade; Towers and Reach for the Stars. I didn't make the traveling team, making my Science Olympiad season only three months long (January-March).

Towers-I participated in Towers, but I didn't exactly do very well. This is mainly because I only managed to finish one tower in about two months. The one tower I did finish was poor relative to the towers being built by people who did end up making the team.

Reach for the Stars-I also participated in Reach for the Stars, and did decent in it, but still not as well as others who ended up making the team.

7th Grade (2013)
This year, I ramped things up a bit, participating in six events. I did end up making the traveling team, but I was an alternate and did not compete.

Forestry-I participated in forestry, and absolutely hated it. It didn't interest me, and therefore I didn't bother studying for it in my free time (or at all for that matter).

Metric Mastery-I participated in Metrics and did pretty well...at estimation of lengths. As for estimation of mass, I just can't.

Meteorology-I also participated in Meteorology. I did decent in it and I enjoyed it.

Water Quality-I participated in Water Quality. I only did it because it was right after the Meteorology practice, and the coach for Water Quality, who was also the coach for meteorology, said that I should stay for Water Quality. Since we started with macroinvertebrate identification, and I sucked at it, so Water Quality became low priority for me.

Reach for the Stars-I participated in Reach for the Stars again, this year doing even better (I guess it's pretty hard not to).

Rocks and Minerals-I participated in Rocks and Minerals, and although it started off as rather low priority, it definitely gained priority.

Pentathlon-I competed in Pentathlon which was a trial event at regionals. My partners and I ended up getting 2nd.

8th Grade (2014)
This year I kicked it up a notch again, participating in ten events. I did compete this year, in four events; Meteorology, Water Quality, Rocks and Minerals, and Metric Mastery.

Can't Judge a Powder-I participated in Can't Judge a Powder for a little while, but ended up dropping it. Although it did teach me the valuable lesson of observation over inference, I'm just not good enough at fast, coordinated movements.

Science Crime-Although I did see Science Crime through, It was similar to Can't Judge a Powder in the fact that I'm not good at moving quickly but still very coordinated.

Solar System-I participated in Solar System, but it was pretty low priority for me. Something about extraterrestrial water just doesn't interest me that much.

Disease Detectives-I participated in Disease and actually did pretty decent, but didn't compete in it (although I was close).

Water Quality-I decided to do Water Quality again this year, and luckily for me, there weren't macroinvertebrates. For some reason I was good at coral reef indicator organism identification, and I put quite a bit of effort into learning the other stuff. Water Quality went well for my partner and I, and we placed 1st at regionals, 9th at states (I blame the recently killed Gorgonia), and 8th at nationals.

Rocks and Minerals-Continuing the trend of last year, Rocks and Minerals was one of my higher priority events this year. I'm surprisingly good at rock and mineral identification, which is strange when you consider how much Forestry and macroinvertebrates just didn't interest me. My partner and I placed 3rd at regionals, 2nd at states, and 16th at nationals.

Meteorology-I participated in Meteorology again this year, this time competing in it. I started off the season with it as a low priority and I didn't look into stuff about severe storms, but when I was put in for regionals, I started to look into severe storms, and I found out that I really enjoyed it. My partner and I placed 1st at regionals, 1st at states, and 23rd at nationals.

Heredity-I participated in heredity and put in a lot of effort, and did quite decently.

Metric Mastery-I competed in Metrics this year, but it was pretty similar to last year. I'm very good at estimating lengths, but when it comes to estimating the mass of objects, I just can't. My partner(s) and I placed 4th at regionals, 2nd at states (despite feeling horribly about it), and 35th at nationals (despite feeling really great about it).

Boomilever-After one of my teammates recommended that I do at least one building event last year, this year I decided to do Boomilever. After all, I had done Towers. How much different could they be? Well, as it turns out, Boomilever is much more difficult (in my opinion).