The Academic Decathlon is a national scholastic competition designed to stimulate intellectual growth, develop critical thinkers and create lifelong learners.
Competition theme
- ART: The art curriculum will explore technology and art.
- ECONOMICS: The economics curriculum will cover fundamental economic concepts, microeconomics, and macroeconomics and will include a thematic section on technology, innovation, and the economy.
- LITERATURE: The literature curriculum will include critical reading, one long work of literature, and selected shorter works. The long work of literature will be The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin.
- MATHEMATICS: The mathematics curriculum will cover general mathematics, geometry, and an introduction to differential calculus.*
- MUSIC: The music curriculum will explore musical works used in science-fiction films.
- SCIENCE: The science topic will be an introduction to neuroscience and will include a section on technology and neuroscience.
- SOCIAL SCIENCE: The social science topic will be the history of computers.
Academic Decathlon docs
Earn Scholarships
The Alaska Academic Decathlon provides more than $35,000 in scholarships on an annual basis.
The Experience
There are lots of wonderful academic competitions out there. You can go prove you’re the best writer, or the best physicist, or the best speller.
Academic Decathlon isn’t about any of that!
It’s not about demonstrating how good a student you already are. It’s about daring to push your limits, to master college-level material and to practice skills, like public speaking, that might be wholly new to you. It’s about the people you’ll meet along the way—the coaches who will mentor you, the competitors who will challenge you, and the teammates who will become your lifelong friends.
As Decathletes, you’ll learn an exciting new theme each year. You’ll explore seven subjects connected to that theme, from art and science to math and economics. You’ll learn to move an audience not just with facts and rhetoric, but with confidence. And you’ll never do any of this alone. You’ll be working with a team—a team composed of students with a wide range of grades but a single shared goal.
What Happens During the State and National Competitions
Academic Decathlon® isn’t about mastering a single event, but ten different skills and disciplines. Every Academic Decathlon competition, whether it’s a local round or the national finals, will follow the same multidisciplinary format.
You’ll deliver speeches, one on a topic of your choice and one on a topic you’ve never seen before.
You’ll write an essay demonstrating not just what you’ve learned but how powerfully you can argue an idea.
You’ll be interviewed by judges asking you thoughtful questions about your past experiences and your goals for the future.
You’ll take challenging exams in Art, Economics, Literature, Math, Music, Science, and Social Science.
And, at the exciting Super Quiz™, you and your teammates will take turns solving the most stimulating challenges of all from across every subject you’ve studied—while a virtual audience cheers you on.
Scholarships
The Alaska Academic Decathlon provides more than $35,000 in scholarships on an annual basis.
Students can earn scholarships through our premiere partner, Alaska 529, and the University of Alaska Anchorage, Fairbanks and Southeast.
Scholarships are awarded to the highest scoring students AND by coach recommendation and student essays. Some scholarships are open to rural students only.
A look back
2023
2021
2019
2016
2018
2015
2017
