Enloe team earns Wake County's best-ever finish at Envirothon finals

Enloe Magnet High School’s Subchronic Exposure team finished second at the 2026 International NCF-Envirothon, giving Wake County and North Carolina their best result ever in the competition and earning a $10,000 scholarship. Wake County said the finish made history for the county, which identified the students as Claire Skinner, Danica Cheaz, Iris Wang, Saya Newton and Angelina Li.

The international final brought together teams from the United States, Canada, China and Singapore at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in Lincoln, Nebraska. For Wake County, the result put one of its most established academic teams on a global stage built around environmental science.

Subchronic Exposure’s run to the top began long before the international finals. Wake County said the Enloe team had won its fifth consecutive North Carolina Envirothon championship before advancing, underscoring a streak of sustained performance rather than a one-time surge.

That matters in a county where environmental science is more than a classroom subject. Wake County’s Envirothon program describes the competition as a hands-on contest for middle and high school students that combines an online curriculum during the school year, training with professionals, and work that builds teamwork and critical thinking skills. Those are the same kinds of skills that feed directly into local concerns such as water quality, conservation and climate resilience, especially in a fast-growing county balancing development with land and resource protection.

The broader competition has grown into a major pipeline for student science talent. The National Conservation Foundation has handled planning and execution of the international Envirothon since 2014 and says the competition engages more than 25,000 high school students every year. It also describes Envirothon as North America’s largest high school environmental education competition.

Wake County Government publicly congratulated the Enloe students on social media after the result, highlighting the team’s historic finish. For Wake County, the award is both a record and a signal that local students are already competing at a level tied to the region’s long-term environmental needs.