Congratulations to Ryan Szymanski ’27 who competed at the FSU Certamen Tournament October 18 in Tallahassee. FSU Certamen is an annual, quiz-bowl style competition hosted by Florida State University for students of Latin and classical studies, testing their knowledge of the Latin language, history, mythology, literature and culture. Ryan represented the entire Tampa Prep team, competing solo against teams of 3 or 4 and was the third highest scoring “team” overall, qualifying for finals!
Ryan also competed at Yale Certamen, November 1 at Yale University in New Haven CT. Once again, Ryan competed solo, making up the entire Tampa Prep team and placed second overall, among nearly 30 teams, in the Advanced A division, with a final score of 560, beating teams of 3 – 4 students by more than 100 points, as well as winning “Advanced MVP” honors, which is awarded to the student who gets the most individual questions correct.
Ryan, who started Tampa Prep in 9th grade and currently serves on the State Board of the Florida Junior Classical League of Latin, was gracious enough to answer a few questions for us recently about his love for all things Latin.
TP: When did you first become interested in Latin?
RS: “I first became interested in Latin when I was in 5th grade, and was introduced to a language that was from thousands of years past.”
TP: Did that factor into you deciding to come to Tampa Prep?
RS: “Absolutely. I was conscious that Tampa Prep had a competitive Latin program and I wanted to not only be involved but I wanted to help grow the program. I wanted the thrill and challenge of building something bigger.”
TP: How have Latin faculty Mr. Seary and Mr. Sewell helped you, with your love of Latin?
RS: “I respect them both very much. I’ve had a number of conversations with Mr. Seary about Roman history. And Mr. Sewell is a beast of the Latin language. He’s gotten my mind to think in ways I never would have dreamed of – to think about and truly understand Latin. Not just to code and translate it into English.”
TP: What is it that you love about Latin?
RS: “Fundamentally, to study Latin is to participate in living history. Latin is the learning language of the elites. What people don’t understand about the term “dead language” is that Latin doesn’t have a native population of speakers. But that doesn’t mean that nobody speaks it.
It’s so fun to study and to learn history and mythology and to apply that competitively through the Latin language.”
TP: What are your future plans?
RS: “I fully intend to double major in Classics and something else, with Classics being the definite. Also, I want to go someplace where I can found my own Certamen tournament. This is well-precedented among schools such as Harvard, Yale, FSU and UF.
We’re taking a delegation of middle & high schoolers to the annual Fall Forum – this year it’s in Ocala. I want to do anything and everything to promote Latin Club and the Latin language. The more people that partake in the forum, the more people discover interest and passion they never thought they had, necessarily.”
