Vera Muller (10) was recognized as a USA Biolympiad (USABO) semifinalist on Feb. 24.
The exam, which took place on Feb. 4, is a national high school competition for selecting the U.S. team for the International Biology Olympiad, the biology world championship for high schoolers. The exam had technical difficulties this year, with two of the question’s images not displaying, thus the questions were removed. The top five percent of test takers move on to the semifinal round, with this year’s cutoff being 25 out of 48 questions.
Since the Biology Olympiad Club’s founding in 2023, Muller is the club’s first semifinals qualifier.
Outside of Biology Olympiad Club, Muller is also one of the coordinators of the Science Olympiad club and the first chair cello of the school’s orchestra.
How do you feel about being able to qualify for semifinals?
“I feel really lucky, and I’m really glad that there was such a strong support system of the biology club to help me in achieving this.”
When did you start studying for the exam?
“There isn’t really a time I say I started it. I’ve always been really interested in biology and I’ve always done different biology related things. For example, I did Science Olympiad last year and the year before, and that involves some of the topics that really appear on the USABO, but I started preparing specifically for the USABO in November. Studying for Science Olympiad kind of correlates to studying for anatomy on the biology exam.”
What do you do in the club?
“I made a presentation for one of the topics, and I find it really helpful that we have a presentation [each week] because each person becomes an expert in your topic and presents it, so other people can understand it.”
How did you feel before and after taking the exam?
“Before taking it, I was really, really nervous. While I was taking it, there were some questions like ‘when you recognize that this is the right answer, I’m confident.’ It was very nice to have some questions that I actually knew I was correct on, but I had no idea how well I did [right after].”
When did your passion for biology start and how did it develop over time?
“[In middle school,] I had a vague idea that I perhaps was interested in the STEM subjects, so I wanted to do something STEM. I’ve been doing Science Olympiad since seventh grade, and I joined the [Carmel Valley Middle School] team, and I think it was quite instrumental in helping me find what I was interested in, both in general STEM and what aspects of biology I find interesting.”
Do you have a favorite topic in the USABO exam?
“Generally, my favorite subject is biology, but my favorite topic on the USABO exam was cell biology.”
There were some technical difficulties across the entire exam, how did you feel about those?
“I was very sad about the two questions because both of those questions are my specialties.”
What are some of your future goals?
“In the far future, I hope to do what I’m interested in. Biology is currently one of my interests, so I assume I’ll do something related to biology.”
