A team of Iola High School students has shown once again just how much they know about being smart consumers.
Ryan Eyster, a junior, and seniors Taylor Heslop, Yohon Sinclair, Abigail Taylor and Clara Wicoff won the State LifeSmarts Challenge Feb. 29 in Wichita, beating out 11 other regional champions.
Next, they’ll compete against other state champions at the national competition in Denver April 9-12.
The competition is geared as “the ultimate consumer challenge” and focuses on five key topic areas: consumer rights and responsibilities, the environment, health and safety, personal finance and technology.
Not only did Iola win the team competition, each of its five competitors won their individual area of expertise.
Eyster, for example, earned the top score in technology. Heslop was tops in health and safety, Sinclair bested all comers in personal finance, Taylor took first in environment, and Wicoff scored best in consumer rights and responsibilities.
“But each student has to know all the subject areas,” team adviser Jean Johns said.
The competition consisted of a series of quiz bowl-style events, individual tests and other activities to gauge consumer awareness.
“They may have to identify acronyms or properly read a drug label,” Johns explained.
That the students are so well versed in all areas should serve them well at nationals. That’s because national competitors are prohibited from competing in the same individual areas of expertise in consecutive years.
“That’s why each of these students had majors and minors,” Johns said.
Before heading to Denver April 8, the students have plenty on their plate to keep them busy.
They must design a LifeSmarts T-shirt and produce a minute-long video about LifeSmarts. Teams are rated by the number of page views their videos receive. Iola’s video will be posted March 14.
THE IHS students dodged a bullet with the scheduling. They had to forego participating in prom last year because Prom Night fell on the first day of the national competition in Seattle.
This year’s prom isn’t until April 16, four days after the students return.
