Baala Shakya, Contributing Photographer

On Saturday, over 350 high school students gathered for Yale’s 14th annual national Certamen tournament. 

Organized by Anya AitSahlia ’25, Joseph Laufer ’25 and Jonas Howard ’26, the competition ran from 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. and attracted 82 teams representing 28 schools from 11 states. Similar to the High School Quiz Bowl, the game of Certamen pits three teams against each other in a competition testing their knowledge of classical languages and civilizations.

“It’s an experience which appeals to those with a competitive spirit and to those with a curious mind,” Laufer said. “For some, it’s purely an opportunity to learn, while for others it’s a time to test their knowledge and competitive skills.”

Certamen questions fall into four categories — Latin language, culture and literature, mythology and history. 

Usually, teams consist of four students, each specializing in one of the categories, according to Laufer. However, every year the competition sees “teams consisting of just one student, and some even win,” Laufer added.

In each round of Certamen, players compete to answer 20 questions known as “toss-ups.” All players can buzz in to answer each toss-up, and those who answer correctly can also answer two exclusive bonus questions to score additional points. 

Toss-up questions are awarded 10 points and bonus questions are awarded five points each.

Yale Certamen allows competitors to play at one of three levels of competition: novice, intermediate and advanced. Each level has three preliminary rounds, from which the nine highest-scoring teams advance to a semifinal round. The winners of each of the three semifinal rounds then play in the finals.

This year, professor John Dillon from the Classics Department also spoke to the tournament participants.  

Nikhil Ranjan, a high school math teacher from Texas and former Certamen player, said he came to Yale Certamen as a volunteer to help with logistics and edit Certamen questions.

Ranjan thinks the best part of Yale Certamen is how it serves as the “opening Certamen event of the year for the country to get together.” Many teams from different states come together for the first time since the National Latin Convention, which takes place in July each year. 

Dante Minutillo, a graduate student at Princeton and a five-time attendee of Yale Certamen, echoed Ranjan’s sentiment and told the News that he sees Yale Certamen as a “very nice social opportunity.”

“[Yale Certamen] allows for those of us who are still sticking with the game and moderating to gather together because we’re obviously from very different places,” said Minutillo. “It’s a nice opportunity for us to all come together to see people from our old high schools and just see people compete and see intense finals rounds.”

Carter Herrera, a high school student from New York competing at his first certamen tournament, thought that the tournament was a great way to visit and see the Ivy League colleges up close, as there aren’t many opportunities for him to do so.

Mackenzie Sanford, a student from Virginia competing solo at the tournament, said that she went on a campus tour before competing on Saturday, which made her “like the school even more so than before.”
Sanford also noted that because so many students at Yale Certamen are also part of the Junior Classical League, the largest classical organization in the world, the tournament allowed her to meet both old and new JCL friends.

Jenny Chen, a volunteer and moderator for Yale Certamen, recalled fondly competing as a high school student at Yale and said that she has the tournament to thank for some of her closest friends. She called volunteering for Yale Certamen a “full-circle moment.”

“It’s an especially rewarding experience to bring to others the excitement, joy, satisfaction, determination, and many other emotions that characterize a day of certamen,” said Laufer. “It’s a joy to bring that experience to hundreds of students from all over the country, and, as so many certamen competitors go on to become classics majors, and after that, professors, it’s my own way of giving back to the community of the field of classics which has given so much to me.”

Yale University’s motto, translated into English as “Light and Truth,” comes from the Latin phrase “Lux et Veritas.”

Correction, Nov. 11: The number of teams participating in the tournament has been corrected.