Two-time National Science & Maths Quiz champions, Achimota School, have suffered yet another defeat in the competition, as they lost to Tamale SHS at the one-eighth stage of the 2018 National Science & Maths Quiz and Science Festival.
Tamale SHS snatched the late win with 48 points to seal their place in the quarter-finals while their fierce contenders Achimota School and Apam SHS ended the contests with 45 and 35 points respectively.
The 2017 Quarterfinalists, Tamale SHS, had the final laugh in a tie-breaker with Achimota School after both schools failed to secure a win in the five rounds of competition.
At the end of the penultimate round, Tamale SHS was in the lead with 42 points closely followed by their competitors, Achimota School with 39 points and Apam trailing with 32 points.
Achimota School came back strongly in the fifth round to equal the points of Tamale SHS.
Achimota School unraveled two riddles to equal Tamale SHS points while Tamale SHS and Apam SHS managed to pick one riddle each.
Per the rules of the contest, if there is a tie at the one-eighth and quarterfinal stage, a single question is to be used in breaking the tie. The first school to ring and answer the question correctly sails through to the next stage of the contest.
Achimota School and Tamale SHS failed to make the first two questions count in their favour, after they both could not provide the expected response to the question. It was Yunus Maltiti Mohammed, a contestant of Tamale SHS who composed himself and delivered the answer to the third tiebreaker question to win the contest for his school.
The two-time victors, Achimota School have over the past three years had a difficult campaign in the National Science & Maths Quiz.
In 2016, they lost to “underdogs”, Nifa SHS in a nerve-wracking contest at the one-eighth stage of the competition and failed to make it past the 2017 Regional Competition; losing to St. John’s Grammar School.
Achimota School will have to fight their way back to NSMQ2019 edition through the Regional Competition.
The stakes are high and the 27 quarterfinalists will not only be looking forward to beating their competitors but with higher scores to increase their cash prize from GCB Bank, Sponsors of the Money Zone.
At the one-fourth stage, each of the competing schools will receive a cash prize of five Ghana cedis (GHS5) multiplied by their total points accumulated at the end of the contest.
The National Science & Maths Quiz and Science Festival is sponsored by the Ghana Education Service through the Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS), with support from GCB Bank, GTP, Lancaster University Ghana, Academic City College, Medifem Multi-Specialist Hospital, Accra College of Medicine, Hawtie Makeup, West African Centre for Cell Biology for Infectious Pathogens and Awake Purified Drinking water. The Sci-Tech Fair is sponsored by Goil, Prudential Life Insurance Ghana, and Tullow, while Bond Savings & Loans and RMG Ghana Ltd are sponsoring the Mentorship Sessions.
