This year for Catholic Schools’ Week, Mater Christi School decided to compete in a virtual Geography Bee challenge! MCS is no stranger to holding a National Geographic Geography Bee, as we have had one each of the last twenty-plus years. However, the National Geographic Society canceled the event this year because of COVID-19.  Mr. Brent Tremblay, our middle school social studies teacher, decided to keep the tradition going virtually. Prior to the virtual event, a preliminary competition occurred in each homeroom in grades 4-8 to determine a homeroom champion. Each homeroom champion would then compete in the school-wide virtual competition against each of the other homeroom champions. On Thursday, February 4, each homeroom joined a Google Meet to witness the competition on the classroom Smartboard. Meanwhile, each homeroom champion joined the competition on their individual devices so that they could answer their questions live.  

The hotly contested GeoBee came down to two students who faced off in the championship round head-to-head, each facing three questions. Seventh-grader Ben Edwards came out on top, answering 3 of 3 final questions to claim his second straight school championship. Eighth-grader Anne LaMantia narrowly missed forcing a tiebreaker, answering 2 of the 3 questions correctly. Normally, Ben would move on to compete against school champions from many of the other middle schools in the state, but the competition was canceled for the second year in a row.