Roanoke alumna lands spot as 'Jeopardy!' contestant

A Roanoke College alumna recently took her love of trivia to national television.

Julia Novakovic '06 will make her television debut on Monday as one of three contestants on the well-known quiz show, "Jeopardy!."

Novakovic, who works as an archivist at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, N.Y., is a self-described trivia nerd who participates on a weekly trivia team in Rochester.

Several times, she took "Jeopardy!'s" 50-question online test to try to land a spot on the quiz show. Her test score in April made the cut.

"Jeopardy!" representatives invited her to Boston in May to audition for the show. Novakovic and a group of about 19 others who auditioned fielded practice questions and used buzzers to answer them.

"It was really fun," Novakovic said.

She didn't know if she made the final contestant list until she received a phone call in August. "Jeopardy!" organizers were on the line, inviting her to compete on the show on Sept. 7 in Los Angeles.

Immediately, Novakovic began preparing for her television trivia appearance. She made flashcards to brush up on numerous subjects that she thought could be question topics on the show. Her friends also created mock quiz shows to help her practice.

"I felt like I was learning all of high school and college in one month," said Novakovic, who majored in History and French at Roanoke.

While at Roanoke, she also interned and worked for Linda Miller, the College's archivist, and for four years, she was a student employee at Fintel Library. Several years after graduating from Roanoke, Novakovic earned a master's degree in library and information science, with a concentration in archives, from the University of Pittsburgh.

In Los Angeles, she appeared in one of five "Jeopardy!" episodes that are taped each day.

Novakovic could not divulge the details of her performance, but she said it was stressful to master using the buzzer that contestants press to answer each question. If contestants press the buzzer before host Alex Trebek finishes asking a question, they are locked out of the system briefly, she said.

Novakovic plans to watch the quiz show on Monday at a viewing party with friends in Rochester.

"Jeopardy!" airs on CBS stations in various national markets. In the Roanoke Valley, the show airs weekdays at 7:30 p.m. on CBS-affiliate, WDBJ7.