Seventh grade students at Stella Schola Middle School in the Lake Washington School District recently participated in the National Latin Exam.

The one-hour test consisted of 40 questions ranging from Latin root words, verb conjugations and case endings (e.g. genitive, nominative, accusative, etc.) to questions regarding a multi-paragraph Latin story which students had to translate in their heads.

More than 134,500 students took the National Latin Exam this year, including some from all 50 United States and 11 foreign countries — Australia, Bulgaria, Canada, England, Italy, Japan, Mozambique, New Zealand, Poland, Zimbabwe and Brazil.

Eighteen of the students from Stella Schola Middle School placed in the top 85th percentile in the nation, earning a certificate and a purple ribbon. Three students scored in the top five percent in the nation: Zein Charania, Michael Pavlov and Merlin Erickson.

Other purple ribbon winners from Stella Schola were Hannah Campbell, Nathan Lees, Fortune Rodriguez, Cody Duoos, Emily Robinson, Patrick Blomgren, Talbot Bluechel, Amy Johnson, Eric Hsu, Zachary Sweetser, Katy Sjolund, Madeleine Suggs, Leila Cahn, Reilly Werth.