12.14.11
MS Geography Bee
Nineteen middle school students qualified for this year's Middle School Geography Bee. They were joined by the winner and runner-up of the elementary school Bee. The participants included:Josh Anderson, Riley Callahan, Will DeMey, Ben Espinoza, Abigail Groters,Jacob Hale, Brett Harbaugh-Clark, Trevor Hoogendoorn, Jacob Houseman,Dan Kuiper, Isaac Nunez, Raymond Palatine, Emily Penning, Cody Riordan, Patrick Roelofs, Joseph Sikes, Jaszmine Simmons, Elijah Tornow, Robyn VanStaalduinen, Ellie Wiener and Alexander Zebutis.
The students cruised through the first three rounds until difficult Round 4 knocked eight of the contestants out of competition. The remaining students fought it out and dropped a few at a time until Round 7 eliminated four more contestants. It took a moment for everyone to realize we had reached the final two, Will DeMey (5th grade) and Jaszmine Simmons (7th grade).
The Championship Round ended in a tie breaker, which is the first time we've had a tie at this level of competition. The Bee then entered "sudden death" so the first person who answered a question correctly that his opponent misses would win. The second question in the tie breaker, Will knew the answer was "Mali", making him the victor!
Although this isn't the first time that the winner of the ES Geo Bee won the MS Bee, it IS the first time a 5th grader will go on to represent Timothy in the next level of competiiton.
Congratulations to Will, runner-up Jaszmine and all of our competitors!