What You'll Learn

You’ll always learn something different. Each year, the Academic Decathlon^® selects a new theme for teams all over the country to explore. The theme shapes an entire course of studies—and brings it all together. The more years you participate in Academic Decathlon, the more themes you’ll master. And, since our curriculum team develops these themes with special attention to national content standards, you’ll find you’re becoming not just a more knowledgeable Academic Decathlete, but a stronger all-around student.

The theme for the 2020-2021 Academic Decathlon is The Cold War.

• ART: The art curriculum will explore early American art.
• ECONOMICS: The economics curriculum will cover fundamental economic concepts, microeconomics, and macroeconomics and will include a thematic section on colonial and early American economic history.
• LITERATURE: The literature curriculum will include critical reading, one long work of literature, and selected shorter works. The long work of literature will be Wieland; or, The Transformation, An American Tale by Charles Brockden Brown.
• MATHEMATICS: The mathematics curriculum will cover algebra and trigonometry.*
• MUSIC: The music curriculum will present an introduction to early American music.
• SCIENCE: The science topic will be an introduction to chemistry and will include brief discussions of significant advancements made in chemistry during the last half of the eighteenth century and the early nineteenth century.**
• SOCIAL SCIENCE: The social science topic will be the American Revolution and the founding of the United States of America.

 
https://www.usad.org/The-Experience/How-the-Events-Work.aspx update theme text on this page. The theme for the 2022-2023 Academic Decathlon is The American Revolution and the New Nation.