Francis Parker School Earns 2024 Academic League Championship

Students from Francis Parker School used their vast knowledge to earn the title of countywide 2024 Academic League champions during the final rounds of the competition.

The county's brightest students from four high school teams went head-to-head at the semifinal and final rounds, which included questions about everything from physics and poetry to video games and Jimmy Buffet.

In the final round, the students at Francis Parker School earned 560 points to beat the team from Del Norte High School, which earned 380 points.

Academic League is a lightning-fast, team version of Jeopardy. High schools that participate in the Academic League put together teams that compete in four regional leagues across the county. Once league winners are selected, the champs of each league face-off until the San Diego County Academic League champion team emerges.

SDCOE has supported the event for more than four decades.

For the first time, the finals were hosted by a student: Abigail Ross, a Coronado High School senior who goes by the stage name AB Coal.

“I’ve always dreamed of being a talk show host,” she said. “It feels unreal.”

The format features questions from moderator Mark Heinze, which cover a wide variety of topics and subjects including science, literature, history, math, and music. Five students play on each team at a time, with substitutions allowed during timeouts, buzzing in to answer questions. Many questions are toss-ups, where the first team to ring in and correctly answer earns points; if the team answers correctly, they receive a bonus question worth more points. Points are deducted for incorrect answers to toss-up questions, and the other team then has three seconds to answer the question correctly.

How to Watch the Competition

Replays of the semifinal and final matches will be broadcast on iTV Cable 16 at the following times or you can watch online.

Academic League 2024 County Championship 

• June 2 at 6 p.m.
• June 21 at 8 p.m.
• June 22 at 5 p.m. 

Academic League 2024 semifinal Del Norte High vs Olympian

• June 7 at 8 p.m.
• June 8 at 5 p.m.
• June 9 at 6 p.m.

Academic League 2024 semifinal Francis Parker vs Santana

• June 14 at 8 p.m.
• June 15 at 5 p.m.
• June 16 at 6 p.m.