THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, June 11, 1994 TAG: 9406110336
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: D4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHARLENE CASON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940611 LENGTH: Medium
At least that's what six students of Cape Henry Collegiate's upper school thought, and they spent the entire school year fine-tuning that connection. Last week, the group's updated version of the classic Greek epic, ``The Iliad,'' won them second place in the Odyssey of the Mind World Games, held in Ames, Iowa. They competed against more than 5,000 students from 17 countries.
{REST} Odyssey of the Mind is an international problem-solving organization for elementary and secondary school students. Competition guidelines are difficult and precise, and every competing team has the same problem to solve.
Cape Henry entered the drama competition and had to choose a chapter from ``The Iliad'' and somehow relate it to modern life. The three girls and three boys used puns, accents, mechanized scenery and scavenged props to make their brief performance clever and comical.
The Cape Henry team won the state competition in April and competed against 54 teams in their division. A Denver, Colo., school took first place.
``This is just so exciting. It's not a matter of who beat us. This feels as good as first place,'' said team coach, Lynette Crain.
Crain and her fellow coach, Susan Fisher, are parents of team members.
The Cape Henry team received 152.5 points, out of a possible 200, for their long-term problem, the play; 82 out of 100 points for a spontaneous problem; and 43 of 50 points for costuming, staging and special effects.
Coaches' involvement in the problem-solving process is limited: They cannot contribute to the solution, make costumes or help find props. The team can spend no more than $80 on the production, and the play can be up to eight minutes long.
Odyssey of the Mind participants, or ``OMers,'' audition team members at the beginning of the school year and choose to work on a drama, music, math or science problem.
The challenge is to solve it as creatively as possible.
Even introverted students will try out for the drama problem, thinking they can work behind the scenes on some technical or creative piece of the solution, said team sponsor Bill Wagner, who teaches math and science at Cape Henry's middle school. Inevitably, however, they gain enough confidence to perform in front of others.
``And those who would never in this world get up and do a play will build something for a math or science problem, then show it to others,'' he said.
In the nine months of working together, the winning team members said, they became close and learned to depend on each other.
Brian Walker, a junior, said working on the project taught him ``to compromise, and to always reach for a more creative way to approach problems.''
Other team members agreed, saying that friendship and mutual respect played important roles in finding a common solution.
``OM has created a special bond between us. We'll always stay friends,'' freshman Stacie Crain said.
by CNB