Local Student Represents City of Jackson and State of Tennessee in National Microsoft Championship
JACKSON, Tenn. - One Madison Academic High School student is not only representing the city of Jackson, but the state of Tennessee in a Microsoft national championship.
Madison Academic sophomore Samuel Latham is representing both our city and our state in a national Microsoft competition in Orlando, Florida.
His summer just got even more interesting, as he will be typing away for the chance to become the national champion.
What started out as just being in a Computer Applications class, turned into Latham’s motivation to become advanced in Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel.
“Stay calm first of all, because it is a timed competition. Don’t want to get too worked up about anything, I say work through what you know… so it gives you the different tasks and you want to go and just knock them out, one by one, once one task is done… move on, and if there’s a task you’re struggling with, skip it and come back later, because the more you get done the higher score you can have.”
Latham explains how he won the state championship, and how he plans to win the national championship.
He tells himself to be confident, work through what he knows, skip what he doesn’t, and move on.
The Microsoft championship is just one thing on Latham’s schedule, he is also in Madison Academic’s soccer and cross-country teams, and after school you can find him at Boy Scouts.
Latham’s computer applications teacher, Mr. Garry Carroll, saw Latham’s potential in class, and has been encouraging him along the way.
“There will be 50 states, they’ll sit down at a computer… and like I said, give them the Microsoft program, and say “Here’s your file, do this…” and so they’ll have 50 minutes, just a little less than an hour, to complete roughly 40 tasks.”
Mr. Carroll reports the Microsoft competition consists of advancing through different tasks, quickly and accurately.
He, and Madison Academic High School, are rooting for Latham as he competes one week from today.
