Seventh-grader Sofia Frohna recently won the Culver City Middle School Geographic Bee and moves one step closer to a $25,000 college scholarship. The school-level bee, at which students answered oral questions on geography, was the first round of the annual National Geographic Bee, sponsored by the National Geographic Society and financial services company ING America. Seventh-grader Dylan Blaisdell took second place.
The kickoff for this year’s GeoBee was in November, 2010. Thousands of schools around the United States and in the five U.S. territories participated. The school winners, including Frohna, took a written test, and finishing as one of the state’s top 100 scorers, she was eligible to compete in the state GeoBee. Frohna is now on her way to Sacramento to compete as Culver City Middle School’s third participant in the state competition in the last decade.
For winners of the state competition, the National Geographic Society will provide an all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., for state champions and teacher-escorts. State champions will participate in the National Geographic Bee national championship on May 24 and 25. The first-place national winner will receive a $25,000 college scholarship and a lifetime membership in the National Geographic Society.
Jeopardy! host Alex Trebek will moderate the national finals on May 25, and the program will air on the National Geographic channel, and afterward on PBS. Check local listings for dates and times.
Anyone can brush up on the GeoBee challenge, an online geography quiz at Nationalgeographic.com/geobee, which poses five new questions a day from previous National Geographic Bees. The GeoBee challenge board game, sold at Target stores, also provides geography fun for the whole family. The board game recently won the Prestigious Parents’ Choice Award.
The National Geographic Society is one of the largest nonprofit scientific and educational organizations. The 114-year-old Society reflects the world through magazines, books, maps, television and interactive media. National Geographicmagazine, the official journal of the Society, has a circulation of about 10 million and is read in every country in the world. National Geographic Channel, a daily television cable network that launched in the U.S. in January 2001 is available in more than 34 million homes. The Society has funded more than 7,000 scientific research projects and supports an education program combating geographic illiteracy.