Spa City 6th-grader wins geography bee

He’ll again represent state in D.C.

— Motorists who drive in circles trying to get to their destinations or rely on a GPS device for verbal directions might ask 11-year-old Christian Boekhout for help.

On Friday, for the second consecutive year, the sixthgrader from Hot Springs won Arkansas’ Geographic Bee.

“I was really really nervous,” said Christian, who grinned, shook his small fists and hit his knees in joy when he realized he had won.

Last year, Christian, who attends Hot Springs Intermediate School, came in 30th in the National Geographic Bee in Washington. He hopes to do even better this year when he represents Arkansas at the May 22-24 event.

Christian is surrounded by geography at home, where his mother, Sandra Billie, said maps adorn each wall in his bedroom and in a playroom. He also owns two globes and has 13 atlases at his disposal.

Coming in second and third, respectively, were Nathan Plowman, 13, of Springdale and Samia Ismail, 14, of Fort Smith.

The winning question for Christian was which land-locked African country harvests timber and floats it down the Ubandi River to the Democratic Republic of Congo. The correct answer was the Central African Republic.

Nathan attends Helen Tyson Middle School. Samia, the only girl among the 10 finalists, attends Greenwood Junior High School.

Some questions were easy, such as which U.S. city is home to the Wrigley Building and the Magnificent Mile. Answer: Chicago. Some were harder, dealing with the locations of volcanoes and U.S. “biomes,” areas defined by the predominant plants and animals.

Up to 100 fourth- to eighthgraders from each state, the District of Columbia, U.S. territories and the Defense Department’s dependent schools compete in geography bees around the country.

Each state winner gets $100, “The Complete National Geographic” on DVD and an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington for the national finals at the headquarters of National Geographic.

The first prize nationally will be a $25,000 college scholarship and a lifetime membership in the National Geographic Society. Secondand third-place winners get $15,000 and $10,000 scholarships, respectively.

The national winner also gets to travel with a parent or guardian on an expenses-paid trip to the Galapagos Islands “to experience geography firsthand through up-close encounters with the wildlife and landscape of the islands,” according to the National Geographic Society.

Arkansas, Pages 11 on 03/31/2012

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