The Mount Pleasant High School Calculator Applications team has advanced to the State UIL Academic Meet in Austin on May 3-5 for the second year in a row.  The team of Juniors David Barboza, Jose Liera, and Pornphiphat Saiboonchan and Senior Sanum Shahid are Regional Champions and earned the right to compete at State.

“Of the four students on the team, three have experience at the State UIL Meet,” said Dr. Judi Saxton, MPISD’s Director of Communications. “Sanum advanced to State last year as a member of the Calculator Applications team which took 1st at the 2017 State Meet. David and Jose both advanced to State in 2016 and 2017 as members of the Math team that took second place in state last year.”

Individually, Jose Liera placed 2nd in Math and Enrique Martinez (Senior) placed 1st in Current Events. Both are advancing to State as well. Jose Liera placed 3rd individually in calculator applications.

At the Regional Meet, the Math team of Jose Liera, Pornphiphat Saiboonchan, David Barboza, and Nathon Segovia (Senior) placed 2nd as a team but did not get the wildcard so did not advance to state as a team. Only the 1st place team and the team with the second highest score (wildcard team) advance to the State Meet.

Also at the Regional Meet, Maritza Zambrano (Junior) placed 5th in Informative Speaking and Rocio Hernandez (Junior) placed 6th in Spelling.

“We are excited that the Calculation Applications Team, Jose in Math and Enrique in Current Events are advancing to state,” Saxton said.  “The ultimate goal for any student participating in UIL is to compete at the State level. These five students reached that goal. We are proud of them and congratulate them on this achievement.”

Photo: UIL Director and Coach Regina Crouch, Enrique Martinez, Jose Liera, David Barboza, Pornphiphat Saiboonchan, Sanum Shahid and Calculator Applications Coach Andy Speir.