Tilly Micallef, sophomore, responds to a question about her favorite memory from this year. “This year, I did Certamen over the summer, and a lot of people would expect me to say, oh, my favorite memory from this year is winning a national tournament,” Micallef remarks when asked this question. Micallef competed as part of the Wisconsin team for the Latin trivia game Certamen at the national tournament over the summer. Micallef and her team won first place nationally in the novice division, an astounding state first.

However, Micallef claims that winning was her second-favorite memory. “I have to say my favorite memory is when I really started to click with my team that I worked with… once I started to get to know them a bit better… and started feeling comfortable with them, I was just like… oh.”

Once Micallef had begun to feel safe with her team, everything else fell into place. She started awaiting practices with excitement and anticipation instead of dreading them, and grew far closer with her team, planning to compete again next year. “I liked making friends. Which is funny, because I don’t think I make friends super often. When I do, it’s a super great feeling.”