PHOENIX Denny, 11, loves learning about the world.
He has a keen interest in history and debating, and says that’s mostly because he likes to prove a point in an argument.
The St Joseph’s Primary School, Merewether year 6 student has jetted off to Thailand to challenge his brain in the 2025 World Scholar’s Global Round from September 5 to 10 at the Aksra Theatre and Siam Pic Ganesha in Bangkok.
It’s the first time a High Potential and Gifted Education student from the Maitland-Newcastle Catholic Diocese will go international.
“I like that this competition has a bunch of diversity in all the topics. Usually, tests are English, maths and reasoning. That’s it. But this is some history, some English, some music and social studies. Even topics I’ve never heard of,” he said.
The idea of the cup is to create an alternative to traditional academic competitions. Teams work in twos or threes to compete in challenges like a multiple choice test, collaborative writing and a team debate.
Phoenix recently competed at a regional round, which advanced him to going global, and said he thoroughly enjoyed the debating.
“It was by far my favourite because I enjoy public speaking. But even in the multiple choice, we had a question on what was Shakespeare’s third last poem before he died,” he said.
It was unlike any test I’ve ever seen; there was absolutely no maths, which surprised me. It really tested me. Overall, it was just really fun.”
Phoenix looked forward to going overseas and hoped to make life-long friends with similar interests.
This piece has been taken from The Newcastle Herald.
