Latin teacher Mr. Robert Epler sits in anticipation. Seated on his couch and logged in on his laptop, he waits tensely as an online quiz begins. Fifty questions later, it’s all over. No response from the computer, he would never know how well he did, that is until a few weeks later when he receives an email from Jeopardy notifying him that he has been invited to audition to become a contestant on the well known game show.
With a knack for remembering facts and a background in quiz bowl, it’s no surprise to anyone who knows the Latin teacher that he was invited to try out for the show…again. “He knows his material inside and out, and is somehow able to convey thousands of years of history in complete detail,” junior Jeremy Pastir said.
Now, Mr. Epler finds himself in a similar situation that he was in four years ago. Competing at the Minneapolis Convention Center, he was one of nine contestants selected from the group of 80 to be candidates for the real show. “You look around the room and realize that all these people are here for the same reason I am and you have to assume they’re all really smart and so I felt like I did okay and had a decent chance. But it’s always surprising when they pull out 10% and you’re one of the 10%,” Epler said.
Though he never got the call to appear on the game show, this past winter, Mr. Epler took the online quiz and was invited back for another audition, this time in Kansas City, Missouri. With prior experience, he will be traveling down the first weekend of May with high hopes and hopefully high odds. “I’m not thinking of it as a lock by any stretch, but the fact that I succeeded once makes me less nervous. I think I’ve got a decent shot,” Mr. Epler said.
If his knowledge portrayed in the classroom is any indication, it would be no surprise to his students if Mr. Epler were to make it on the show. And with a steel trap mind, there are no limits for the success of the Latin teacher this spring as he competes for a spot on the show. “I think I just have a brain that remembers stuff and not all of it is important or useful, but if I can make money off of it, I guess it’s pretty important,” Mr. Epler said.
