CLEVELAND — An 8-year-old student from Cleveland continues to advance as the field dwindles in the America’s Favorite Student competition. With the public’s help, his dream might come true.
Zachary Beasley is a second-grader at West Rowan Elementary School. He placed 6th out of 48 students nationwide in the first round of this competition.
On March 26, he advanced into the Top 20, earning enough votes to continue to the next round.
He is now competing to move into the Top 15, with voting open until Thursday, April 2, at 10 p.m..
The national contest will select one winner to receive a $20,000 grand prize, a feature in Reader’s Digest, and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to meet Bill Nye The Science Guy and tour The Planetary Society with him.
Beasley said that meeting Nye would be a dream.
The second grader has passion and appetite for knowledge and learning. His favorite subjects are math, astronomy and science.
He loves learning about how the universe and solar system formed, more than 13 billion years ago and 4.6 billion years ago, respectively. The sheer scale of the solar system is also fascinating to him.
“It is so huge and cool,” he said. “I love how astronomy explains supernovas and nebulas, the Milky Way and black holes.”
He is a gifted student, an exceptional reader — and loves school, history, music and studying how the universe and its physics work.
His family shared that Beasley plans to go to college to become a scientist or professor and loves sharing what he learns with others. Beasley lives with his very proud parents and his pet hamster Nugget. He is active in Cub Scouts and plays basketball in his community.
Voting is open to the public and resets with each round. Supporters can vote once per day online to help Beasley advance further in the competition.
