Long Island (NY) student ends his teacher’s 25-year Chemistry Regents challenge with a perfect 100

Jojo Yawson earned a perfect 100 on the Chemistry Regents, ending Baldwin teacher Anthony Simonelli’s 25-year $100 challenge.

A quarter-century classroom challenge has finally been settled, and a Baldwin High School student is the one holding the winning score.

Jojo Yawson earned a perfect 100 on New York’s Chemistry Regents exam, becoming the first student in teacher Anthony Simonelli’s 25 years of Regents-level chemistry classes to accomplish the feat. His reward was more than a grade: Simonelli had promised $100 to any student who could achieve it.

The unusual milestone was highlighted by CBS New York, which shared footage of Simonelli and Yawson reflecting on the long-running challenge. Simonelli said thousands of students had passed through his chemistry classes without collecting the prize, making Yawson’s result a moment he had nearly stopped expecting.

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What made the result even more dramatic was how little Yawson thought he had done after leaving the exam. He recalled going home convinced he had missed several questions and was disappointed with his performance.

“I thought I did terrible. I went home dejected. I thought, I don’t know, I thought I missed at least a few questions,” said Yawson.

Simonelli had a similar surprise when the scores were being processed. Yawson had taken the exam in a separate room under testing accommodations, so his paper was among the final exams to reach the teachers. When it was graded and returned with a 100, Simonelli realized the student who had seemingly arrived at the end of the stack had also ended a 25-year wait.

“When it came back with 100, my jaw almost hit the floor. Literally the last kid.”

Baldwin Union Free School District confirmed the achievement, noting that Yawson was a sophomore during the 2025-26 school year and that he became the first student in Simonelli’s Regents chemistry classes to reach a perfect score during the teacher’s quarter-century challenge.

The cash incentive mattered, too. Yawson openly acknowledged that the $100 was a major source of motivation rather than a distant bonus. Simonelli ultimately delivered the prize personally, signing the bill and encouraging Yawson to preserve it as a reminder of what he accomplished.

CBS New York reported that Yawson has also earned a perfect score on the Biology Regents and hopes to pursue civil engineering. Simonelli, meanwhile, has already raised the stakes, offering $200 for the next student who manages a perfect score on the redesigned chemistry exam.

After 25 years of unanswered promises, one student finally gave Simonelli a reason to pay up. Yawson didn’t just collect the $100. He turned a teacher’s longtime challenge into a story his classmates are unlikely to forget.