Erie girl is finalist for $10,000 memory championship
Erie, CO—An Erie sixth-grader will embark in less than three weeks on a voyage to become a national memory champion and earn a $10,000 grand prize.
Pearl Soundron, 11, of Erie, is one of 16 finalists in the National Memory Master competition. On May 2 Pearl will compete in three rounds of academic memory testing during a five-day cruise to the Bahamas aboard the Carnival cruise ship Victory. Each of the finalists received two free tickets to the cruise and $800 in traveling money.
“I’m elated!” Pearl said about earning her way to the finals. “Even though it’s going to be a copious amount of hard work, I know it will be fun and I’m really looking forward to it!”
The 16 finalists have already been through a rigorous series of local and regional competitions to reach the finals. Pearl’s presentation to reach this point linked 12 history sentences to tell the story of Europe, from Charlemagne up to Napoleon’s empire, emphasizing the wars, religion and drive for discovery that characterized that time period.
The three-round championship will cover disciplines such as math, science, English grammar, history, Latin and geography.
The National Memory Master competition is hosted by Classical Conversations, a classical education resource used by homeschoolers in all 50 states and 14 foreign countries. Classical Conversations now has more than 93,000 students enrolled in its tutoring programs.
Pearl attends the Louisville Classical Conversations community near Boulder, Colorado. She is the daughter of Agnel and Sarah Soundron and the oldest of their five children. Pearl is finishing her fifth year as a Classical Conversations, or CC, student.
In her spare time, Pearl enjoys holding her baby brother, gobbling up books, organizing plays with her sisters, and riding her bike to see her grandparents. She said she loves spending time with her family, her friends and her church community.
“Pearl has a compassionate heart and a desire to understand how to live life with a love for God and others,” her mother said. “She is thrilled to be participating in the National Memory Master competition.”
In addition to the National Memory Masters competition, the first CC Capstone Cruise will also feature the third annual National Number Knockout finals and CC’s first high school commencement.
CC provides resources, guidance and a community for a home school curriculum using classical education in three developmental stages: grammar, dialectic and rhetoric, and taught from a Christian worldview, according to its founder, Leigh Bortins. She says CC supports homeschooling parents by cultivating the love of learning through a Christian worldview in fellowship with other families. She believes there are three keys to a great education: classical, Christian and community.
Started in 1997 and headquartered in West End, North Carolina, CC is a family-owned company that provides services to almost 1,900 CC communities around the world. For more information visit www.classicalconversations.com.
Contact:
John Carpenter, Communication Journalist
Classical Conversations
(423) 618-3753
jcarpenter@classicalconversations.com
