With a trip to Belgium egging him on coupled with a natural love of learning and geography, Trey Hines is preparing for the state finals in the National Geographic Bee.
Scheduled for March 30 in Mount Pleasant, Hines is studying 30-45 minutes a day to fill his head with facts about rivers, continents, countries, economies, languages and people, among other things.
The Traverse City West Junior High seventh grader will face off with the 99 other regional winners from around the state. Each contestant will be vying for the state's one spot in the National Geographic Bee, a two-day event in May in Washington, D.C.
Participants at the national level will include one student from each of the 50 states as well as one each from Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, U.S. territories in the Pacific, the District of Columbia and the Department of Defense Schools. Held annually since 1989, four national winners have hailed from Michigan and Hines has a dream of being the fifth.
With his parents promising him a trip to his favorite country should he best all others in the nation's capital, Hines has an extra incentive to crack the books as the days count down. His maternal grandfather hails from Belgium (northern Europe, borders on The Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg and France, two main languages: Flemish and French, population: ten million, 30,000 square kilometers in size.)
"I'd really like to travel,” said Hines, whose favorite subject is math with geography a close second.
Mary Pratt, a seventh grade geography teacher at Traverse City West Junior High, praises Hines' love of learning about the world as key to his success in first the school and then the regional competition.
"He just has a passion for it, whether it be current events or some sort of history,” she said. "I'm lucky to get those kind of kids, that have the extra little interest where he'll just pick up something that has to do with the world.”
"He has a special passion for anything Belgium, a special little spark,” Pratt added.
Also a member of the Northwest Michigan Children's Choir and a tutor of a younger student in math, Hines keeps busy in addition to his geography studies. He is preparing for the upcoming event using at atlas as well as a book Pratt loaned him: "Afghanistan to Zimbabwe: Country Facts that Helped Me Win the National Geographic Bee” by the 2004 winner.
"I'm learning a whole bunch of stuff, stuff I wouldn't know,” summarized Hines of his endeavor. "My geography teacher also gave me tests from the past five years.”
"It's still fun,” he added of his studies.
All his preparation almost did not help Hines during the school's final in January among the 30 top scorers in the seventh and eighth grades. He made it to the top ten in the oral evaluation and then answered the first question wrong in the double elimination event.
"I was really nervous after that,” he recalled.
Hines persevered through final rounds despite his nerves. He was one of two participants left to face off for five founds of sudden death questions at the end, where he triumphed. He then took a National Geographic standard test at school, administered to school winners throughout the state. He was one of the top 100 scores in the Michigan qualified for the state finals next week.
"I had to wait a month or more to find out,” Hines said of that written test.