After months of tireless practices, study sessions, and drills, the work of many Cy Fair ISD students is finally beginning to pay off. On May 4th, students from all across the state will meet at the University of Texas Austin campus to compete at the UIL Academic State Meet.

Connor Duskie, a third-year journalism student, will compete in the Editorial Writing competition among the state’s brightest writers.

“I’m proud and surprised I got this far,” Duskie said. 

Duskie’s advancement to this level is the product of much hard work and practice.

“To practice, I regularly work on writing prompts with Mr. Ricks [the journalism teacher],” Duskie said.

Despite the pressure that many competitors feel, Duskie is confident that he can keep up with the competition.

“I feel as though I’ve worked hard,” Duskie said. “I don’t think many people, me included, expected me to get this far.” 

Also in the realm of writing and literature is Anh Nguyen, who is advancing to the state level for her performance in the Spelling and Vocabulary category.

“This all seems like a dream,” Nguyen said. “This is my first year competing in academic UIL, period. It feels like everything is moving so fast, but I’m really excited at the same time. I’m super pumped to be able to go to UT Austin and compete at State UIL.”

Like Connor, Anh has worked tirelessly to get to where she is now.

“I’ve been studying all the words on Quizlet,” Ngyuen said. “Now, I think I’m going to focus on making sure I spell all the really hard or complex words right.” 

Overall, Anh is excited for the competition and the experience she will gain from it.

“At this point in the competition, I feel that I have studied as much as I can for this event,” Nguyen said. “It all comes down to luck when I’m given words that don’t fall inside the list. At this point, I’ll just rely on my prior knowledge of words and roots to help me spell those words.”

As the competition approaches, competitors have begun to start practicing for the most important competition in the UIL process. Only time will tell, however, what the results are and how the competitors will fare.