When Manhattan High science teacher Pat Lamb looked at the Biology Olympiad test last year, he said, “Dang, this is a test.”

“It was so rigorous. It’s harder than your master’s test. Some of the stuff they ask…I was pretty impressed,” Lamb said. “It’s a test for me and I’ve been in science forever and when I was looking through the test I was having to eliminate and guess between two on quite a few so this was impressive so I thought, ‘we need to do this’. It gives you another thing to shoot for, here’s another level.”

Biology Olympiad is a national competition and each year, out of 20 finalists, four will be chosen to represent the U.S. internationally.

“I’m taking a test for it but other than that, I don’t know anything about it. I think this is our first year doing it,” senior Isaac Blankenau said. “I think it’s a lot like Science Olympiad. It’s my first year [in Science Olympiad], I really like it.”

Lamb is hoping all the Science Olympiad members and his students from his AP Biology class will participate and is beginning to gather a group of people.

“Some of our students are alternates for the Science Olympiad team and I wanted something for them to do, to focus on. They do get to go to practice, competitions…but there’s more of a reward for this. This year in Science Olympiad, we have 28 people — that’s almost enough to make a second team. That second team could have won Regionals. They’re really sharp people. I wanted to give them something to work towards for this first year,” Lamb said. “The chances of us being one of 20 kids in the nation is probably really low. Especially since we’re not studying specifically for that test, we’re just going to take it. But I think it will give them an idea of how much their hard work has done for them.”

As a teacher and coach and a part of many peoples’ lives, Lamb is proud of his students.

“Everything from football to music to drama to science — our students, they’re tough. Tough is a mental thing. It can come out as a physical thing but it’s a mental thing. Will you fold under pressure? When you walk on stage, will you know your parts? Will you know the piece of music you’ve practiced over and over again? Our students refuse to not excel. That’s a double negative but that’s the way they do things. They won’t give up. I love that about our students. You don’t have to be the very best to win, you just have to refuse to give up. If you keep fighting for whatever you want, you’ll get there. If you work hard enough and sacrifice enough you can do anything — I believe that. And I have a little saying, ‘pain is temporary, pride is forever’ and it goes for everything. Studying is a pain. The grades and the accomplishments that come afterwards stay forever. Tough people handle those temporary pains. And that’s the way the kids are here. This is a generalization, but overall, Manhattan kids are tough kids. I don’t think we’re smarter than everybody, I don’t think we’re more physically blessed than everybody but we fight hard,” Lamb said. “I have great students everyday. You want to work hard for them because they work so hard for you. So you look for the little things, like Biology Olympiad. You want all your students motivated. Not just the guys that made the team, everybody. You want everybody to reach their goals.”