Samo student Carlee Jensen competes on “Jeopardy!”

Chase WohrleStaff WriterSamo senior Carlee Jensen was one of fifteen high school students from across the United States chosen to compete in the 2011 “Teen Tournament” for the popular television game show, “Jeopardy!”Jensen played in one round of the competition. Her final score, $8,000, fell short of that needed to move onto the semi-finals, though she returned during the semi-final games as an “alternate.”Jensen had unwittingly been preparing for “Jeopardy!” since she had started high school: she spent three years in Samo’s Academic Decathlon class, where she specialized in literature on the Quiz Bowl team.“Quiz Bowl was like ‘Jeopardy!’ boot camp,” Jensen said. “A lot of the knowledge that helped me during the auditions and on the show came from AcaDeca.”Jensen was one of 200 randomly chosen from around the country to audition after completing an online test. Her audition consisted of three stages: a written test, a non-televised practice game and an interview with the show’s casting directors.  After the audition, she was selected to compete in the televised round.Before finding out if she was chosen or not, Jensen didn’t experience any anxiety.“I just figured it wasn’t a big deal,” Jensen said. “Either I’d get in or I wouldn’t.”During the competiton, Jensen felt the hardest aspect of the game wasn’t necessarily the material, but the speed at which she needed to hit the buzzer.“I read an article by Ken Jennings about how buzzing is the hardest thing, and learning to time your buzzer is the key to success,” she said. If you buzz to early, your buzzer will lock for a fraction of a second, which give your opponents time to get in and take the question - but if you buzz too late, it obviously doesn’t do any good.Jensen says her strongest category was “Quick Lit.” She answered three of the five questions in that category, including one Daily Double. The answer to that question (which earned Jensen $1,000) was Nathanial Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter” - a book Jensen read at Samo as a junior  in Berkley Blatz’s AP Language class.“If I did nothing else right,” Jensen said, “I hope I did Mr. Blatz proud with that question.”Jensen is now ineligible to participate on Jeopardy! in the future, but she says she would do it again if she could, despite her loss.“I didn’t win but I feel grateful to have been a part of the experience,” Jensen said. “I got to be part of a game I’ve loved since I was a little kid –– that’s more than enough.”Jensen was awarded $5,000 for participating in the Teen Tournament.cwhrole@thesamohi.com