By Clara Moffitt
Odyssey of the Mind (OM) is a program that allows youth from elementary school to high school to get together in teams and compete in solving problems. There are “long term” problems that range from building a robot to carry out a given task, to writing a play involving music and dancing.
There are also short term “spontaneous” problems where the team has to solve a problem with only a few minutes to think about a solution. Some of the spontaneous problems are hands-on and the team has to build a structure, and some are verbal and the team has to tell a story, or come up with creative uses for everyday things. This year, Tempe Prep has only one team. They are an all-female team and all are in the 7th grade.
On March 12, our team competed in the regional Odyssey of the Mind competition at Hamilton High School. We met early in the morning and sat down to discuss what needed to happen. Team member Lexi Reis says, “I was super excited and really nervous [for the competition]; I had butterflies in my stomach!”  Alas, it was time to go and compete in Spontaneous. Our name was called and we entered the room. When our Spontaneous event was complete, we walked out confident of our performance. “We had great teamwork and made little mistakes,” says another team member, Kylie Klassen. Spontaneous is extremely secretive, so nobody is able to know what the Spontaneous problem was until June, not even the coach.
Once Spontaneous was over, the team prepared to show their long term project to the judges. This year, our team decided to do a theatrical problem where we had to make a musical involving humor and dance. We all dressed as our characters and started to practice our skit. There were other team that were enjoying watching our team sing and dance.  Finally, we got to load all of our props into the place where we performed.  The performance seemed to go so quickly to the girls. We were pretty worried, but hoped for the best.
Annie Meacham says, “After long-term all I did was worry and think about what I… did wrong.” On the contrary, Coach Klassen says, “The girls did great in long term. They definitely focused on the scoring guide and how to maximize their points.” Now the team had to wait for the awards.
Finally, the clock struck 4:30. All the teams loaded into a large gym. We were all so nervous! “We [all] had our pinkies locked,” said Kylie Klassen, describing when the team was waiting for their place. The announcer began to announce our problem and division. 6th place, 5th place, 4th place, 3rd place, then … “2nd place and going to state: Tempe Preparatory Academy.” We screamed! We were so excited!
Coach Klassen says, “[I was] super excited! They improved so much from last year. I was happy all their hard work paid off.” Later in the awards ceremony, Tempe Prep’s name was called again for an Omer Award. An Omer Award is given when a team is nominated for showing kindness to another team. One judge noticed three Tempe Prep team members watching another team’s long term project and encouraging them.
Coach Klassen says, “This year, the team was much more focused on making progress at each meeting. The team was more self-directed and took advantage of each team member’s strength.”
Tempe Prep’s Odyssey of the Mind team will now be competing at the State Championship in Tucson on April 9. We are now modifying our performance and making it amazing!