User:Tailsfan101

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Tailsfan101 (me) is a division B Science Olympiad competitor who entered competition in 2017 for the middle school team Treasure Valley Home School in the state of Idaho. His team won state competition in 2017 and 2018 and earned the right to go to Nationals in 2017 and 2018.

2017

 * Legend: State finish / Nationals finish


 * Disease Detectives: 1 / 16
 * Road Scholar: 2 / 51
 * Fast Facts: 4 / 59
 * Dynamic Planet: - / 50

2018

 * Legend: State finish / Nationals finish


 * Disease Detectives: 2 / TBD
 * Road Scholar: 1 / TBD
 * Crime Busters: 1 / TBD
 * Microbe Mission: 3 / TBD

Current signature
Go check my scioly.org account, or get lazy and hope I post it here.

Old signatures
Virus and bacteria You don't want to catch, They get inside your body And they make you retch!

This certain kind of science Gives you much to learn, Categories, letters Everywhere you turn!

I study my quadrangles, At all sorts of angles, I find a certain key, Which locates things for me!

[spoiler]DD, FF, Road[/spoiler]

[hide]Best team finishes at Wright State Nationals:|Disease Detectives (16) Mission Possible (17) Optics (24) Food Science (29) ^DD is the only one I competed in.[/hide]

Tests Taken
Here's a list of ratings on the tests I've taken:

Disease Detectives 2017, State
(1st) This test was fairly easy, except for something my partner (Nerd_Bunny) and I were unfamiliar with: sensitivity and specificity. But somehow, she figured it out, and we won. The test had a good length to it (keeping us working for a full 20 minutes), and it covered many aspects of the event. 8/10

Road Scholar 2017, State
(2nd) I found this test to be quite long, but it was well run and covered essentially everything Road Scholar should cover. It was challenging and certainly time-consuming, but I still enjoyed taking it. 8/10

Fast Facts 2017, State
(4th) This test was well run, and the biology room it was run in was very nice. The test itself, however, was less than desirable. Some categories were quite basic, some were quite obscure, and one was completely off the grid (Five-letter Science Terms). 4/10

Disease Detectives 2017, Nationals
(16th) A long test (23 pages), but fairly easy and covering the aspects of the event very nicely.It didn't take a long time to get through, and the division of the test into two separate cases was well done. Plus, the room it was in was really cool! 10/10

Road Scholar 2017, Nationals
(51st) Definitely the worst Nationals test I took. The whole test was confusing, starting from the very first few questions ("What paper was this map printed on", "What ink was used on this map", and "How many of Ohio's presidents died in office?"). I probably saved us from a complete bomb by going for the tiebreakers first. 4/10

Fast Facts 2017, Nationals
(59th) At least my partner and I had fun with this test. We found it to be quite challenging, yet the test was still well written. Some categories were hard (i.e. "Flightless Birds", "Famous Female Scientists"), but all were descriptive enough so that we knew what they were asking (i.e. "Unstable Chemicals"). 8/10

Dynamic Planet 2017, Nationals
(50th) This test pleased me. The questions weren't completely random, as some of the practice tests I took were, and they had a nice flow. The part that stands out to me most is tracking a lava flow, which, to my surprise, I found to be fairly simple. I was happy with my finish, because I did it alone and had a month to prepare. 9/10

Disease Detectives 2018, State
(2nd) A fairly easy test, as I think it was only seven pages long. Despite a relatively short length, the questions seemed to cover important aspects well. They included multiple case scenarios, but managed to come up with different questions for each, varying in difficulty. My one objection is that they gave the exact same test to Division B and Division C, decreasing the difficulty for C. 7/10

Road Scholar 2018, State
(1st) I loved this test. By using a state highway map and several quadrangle maps, the test had many different types of questions, yet all seemed appropriate for the maps used. Aside from the 33 questions, it also included map drawing and a stream gradient, both of which were challenging but fun. 10/10

Crime Busters 2018, State
(1st) The test certainly lacked some things, as chromatography was completely absent, and the plastics were given on the test. Also, if you wanted to test unknowns with water, HCl, or iodine, you had to bring your samples to the front of the room. However, there were 14 unknowns, including two mixtures, which seems to be a good amount for our state. The test itself was well written, and the way the unknowns applied to the suspects had a nice chemistry (pun intended). 6/10

Microbe Mission 2018, State
(3rd) Microbe Mission (3) - This test had a great length to it, and the questions showed a good variety. Interestingly, in a section where it required me to label different bacterial shapes, the funny thing is that I had the exact same diagram on my cheat sheet that they used, only without labels. Unfortunately, there was nothing about diseases on the entire test, which was very disappointing to me. 7/10

Event Affinity
Here is a list of all events I have competed in, ranked from my favorite to my least favorite.
 * 1) Disease Detectives
 * 2) Microbe Mission
 * 3) Road Scholar
 * 4) Crime Busters
 * 5) Dynamic Planet
 * 6) Fast Facts