For a second consecutive week, an Arlington Public Schools alum will be making an appearance on “Jeopardy!”
Lydia Cawley, a 2016 graduate of Washington-Lee High School (now Washington-Liberty High School), will be one of three contestants competing on the trivia show on Thursday night.
Cawley’s appearance follows the “Jeopardy!” run of Yorktown High School graduate Quentin Powers last week. Powers, a recent U.S. Peace Corps volunteer, won the March 3 and March 4 episodes and collected over $22,000 before being eliminated on the 5th.
Cawley told ARLnow that she grew up in a family that planned their evenings around “Jeopardy!” episodes, and she has applied to be on the show since she was in college. Last summer was the first time she advanced to the audition round.
Then Cawley got the call in early January that she would be on the show.
During filming in February, Cawley gained an appreciation for the behind-the-scenes work by “Jeopardy!” staff that viewers don’t get to see.
“It gives me so much respect in retrospect and now, as I’m watching the episodes that are coming out, for everyone who’s ever been on the show,” Cawley said. “You’re on a TV show and adding in the audience and the cameras and the lights, it was very surreal.”
Cawley attended Arlington Science Focus School and Swanson Middle School before completing W-L’s International Baccalaureate program. She went on to attend Harvard University and get a full scholarship to the University of Cambridge.
Today, Cawley works in London as a product director for Gen+, an organization teaching young people skills for a rapidly changing world.
Cawley said she gained a kinship with fellow contestants while competing on the show.
“It’s people from all over the country that I probably wouldn’t have crossed paths otherwise, and we have a group text going now,” she said. “We’re all staying in touch because these are the only people who can really relate or who we can really talk to about this crazy experience.”
Cawley credits her Arlington Public Schools teachers for giving her the educational foundation that led her to “Jeopardy!”
“Honestly, a lot of ‘Jeopardy!’ is you having to go back to your high school knowledge,” Cawley said. “I was like, ‘wow, I’m really thankful for the education I got.'”
