Tournament of Minds

The journey to the Tournament of Minds International Finals started in the last few weeks to Term 2. For three weeks, hopeful students gathered in the Junior School library on Thursday afternoons participating in crazy challenges promoting team building and testing their creativity. For those of us lucky enough to be selected for a team, a whirlwind six weeks of rehearsals began before the Regional Final! Six out of our seven teams won in their category at Regionals, meaning that in a couple of weeks we would be going to the State Final!

At States, a record four Girton teams won! This meant that four teams would be moving on to represent Victoria at the International Finals in Canberra (meaning the teachers would have to keep track of 28 of us at Melbourne Airport - what could go wrong?). And while we were all sad to say goodbye to the three teams who had not won at States or Regionals, we were all super excited for the Internationals especially the Team Victoria t-shirts that came with competing.

After a long couple of weeks, it was finally time to go to Canberra! We left Bendigo in a torrent of rain, hoping against hope that our flight wouldn’t be delayed due to floods, and luckily it wasn’t! We arrived in Canberra and settled into our rooms, soon realising there wasn’t actually much for us all to do in Dickson (sorry Canberrans), but we forgot all about that when we received bags full of Tournament of Minds merch, complete with bandanas, drink bottles and a special edition Canberra International Finals 2022 badge. 

The next day was the Opening Ceremony, which meant we were off to Parliament House! So many different coloured shirts from every state filled the Grand Hall. It was awesome to see just how widespread Tournament of Minds really is, but alas, before we had a chance to properly talk to anyone, we had to sit down for the Ceremony. The State teams were called to introduce themselves, meaning we got to stand up and yell out our State chant. This year, because we were such a big group, Girton got to create Victoria’s chant (and frantically teach it to the other teams an hour before the Ceremony). There was also an amazing Welcome to Country that got everyone involved and a speech about the future of space and space travel!

After the Opening Ceremony, we were told to go on a scavenger hunt around Canberra, looking for clues that would lead us to the next meeting place. The Girton teams ended up mostly sticking together and, in all honesty, we thoroughly enjoyed the visit to National Portrait Gallery. Eventually, we were notified of where we were supposed to go, so we split up into our divisions to go to our different activities before getting bussed back to our accommodation. That night, we were told to get a good sleep and we were all so tired from walking around all day that we fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow!

Saturday was the day of the competition! The reason we were here! The energy was electric, everyone was so excited to get in there, do our best and have some fun. Our teams split up yet again to go to different areas of Australian National University, who were hosting this year. The teams entered the Lockdown rooms at 9am and didn’t emerge until just after 12pm. We were all given a long-term problem to solve in three hours (to be presented after lunch) and a shorter spontaneous problem to solve in just four minutes and presented in one minute immediately after solving. The problems were challenging, but we expected nothing less from an International Final. Over lunch our nerves grew, knowing that we would have to present soon, but we enjoyed ourselves, nonetheless, wandering around and enjoying the lunch packs provided by ANU. All too soon, lunch was over, and we were heading back to our allocated lecture theatres for the presentations of everyone’s solutions. I can only speak for the Senior Arts discipline, but everyone’s performances were creative and entertaining and extremely enjoyable to watch. My team was up first which was nerve-wracking, but we did our best, adding parts and improvising here and there when things didn’t exactly go to plan, and we ended up having amazing fun and being really proud of our efforts.

That night meant the awards ceremony! We sat in a little Girton group with our dinner packs beforehand. This was probably my favourite moment of the whole trip. The guitar that was brought all the way to Canberra (and not used in our performance at all, oops) got unpacked and we all sat in a circle with our food eating and singing. It was a lovely peaceful moment before the highly charged atmosphere of the Awards Ceremony.

The energy there was amazing!! Everyone was so supportive, screaming and clapping when the winning teams were called. Unfortunately, none of our Girton teams won, but we came away that night with the knowledge that we had given it our all, created memories that we would never forget, and had the best fun.

The close of the Awards Ceremony also meant the close of our 2022 Tournament of Minds journey. It truly was the experience of a lifetime and I have learnt so much from my own Tournament of Minds journey throughout the years. Thank you so much to Mrs Bath and all the teachers who make this incredible co-curric possible!

Greta Burns (10 Aherne)