The Palo Alto High School Science Olympiad team placed second at the Northern California State Finals on Saturday after winning regionals and earning its spot at states in March.

Although placing second means that it will not compete at Nationals, the team still celebrated after displaying strong individual performances.

“We placed second overall with a bunch of really high individual placements: every single person [for the Paly team] got within top five in multiple events, and most people got first place in something,” one of the club’s presidents, senior Alex Lu said. “Unfortunately, California has two sections, north and south, so only one team from each goes.”

Lu is proud of his team for doing so well, given the team’s conditions compared to that of other teams.

“[Other school’s] have heavily involved coaches, and their science olympiad programs [are] elective class,” Lu said. “This is compared to Paly, in which the majority of our team members don’t join until their sophomore year and Paly’s teacher advisors, who are very supportive, are [more focused on] students running our own club. I really couldn’t be more happy with or proud of this team.”

To wrap up the year, the club is finalizing leadership roles and plans for its camp.

“We’re going to start prepping elections for next year’s presidents and other officers, as well as making sure that the summer camp we run functions smoothly,” Lu said.