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Russellville HOSA Bowl team advances to state competition

Although the Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) organization is not new to Russellville High School, its HOSA Bowl team is very new and already very successful.

Last month, the HOSA Bowl team competed regionally against students from Muscle Shoals High School, Colbert Heights High School and the Lawrence Country Career Technical Center at the Muscle Shoals Career Academy. The Russellville team, made up of seniors Abby Burks, Norma Gonzalez and Harley Thomas and junior Tristan Patrick, placed first in the tournament and are on their way to state competition held in Montgomery in February.

“It was very much a team effort,” said Dr. Stephanie Oliver, the instructor of Health Occupations classes at RHS and advisor of the RHS HOSA chapter. “They practiced once a week and sometimes would meet at McDonald’s to study together. They had no idea what questions they would have during the competition.”

The questions at the HOSA Bowl covered many areas such as medical terminology, anatomy, parliamentary procedures, history of healthcare and HOSA specific questions.  

“The weirdest question I thought that was asked was the medical term for earwax,” said Patrick. “Every team had a unanimous ‘What?’ expression on their faces.”

The Russellville team competed in two rounds and won each round. However, the team felt the pressure when it came down to the final round against a team from Muscle Shoals. The final round lasted for 45 minutes, and the two teams ran through nearly all 112 questions prepared. RHS beat MSHS by at least 25 points, according to Dr. Oliver.

“I feel that we did very well,” said Burks. “I am confident that we will do well at state.”

If the RHS team does well at state competition, they could make it to nationals which are held this summer in Nashville.

“We want to be the first team from RHS to go to nationals,” said Thomas. “It's nice to have a support team. It was great that our classmates came to cheer us on during our competition. Not many people cheer for academics.”

Although the students are enjoying studying and competing in the HOSA Bowl, they are actually interested in pursuing medical careers. Burks plans to attend Northwest-Shoals Community College to study nursing to one day become a labor and delivery nurse. Thomas has been accepted to the University of Alabama in Birmingham for the pre-nursing program. After nursing school, Thomas wants to attend medical school and become a pediatrician. Gonzalez also was accepted to UAB and plans to study pre-medicine to become a pediatrician. Although Tristan has one more year to decide where he would like to attend school, he wants to become a surgeon.

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