SIMMS -- It’s not unusual for small schools to bring in eighth graders to fill out varsity rosters, and in Simms one of this year’s call-ups is a student of the game – and seemingly just about everything else.
Hudson Rohrer has a busy schedule. In addition to playing varsity sports like basketball and football, he has to deal with a level of celebrity in his own school. Everyone knows Hudson – partly because of his athletic skills, but mostly for his brain.
Rohrer is the three-time Sun River Valley middle school geography bee champion, claiming the title as a sixth, seventh and eighth grader. His name adorns a plaque in the hallways of Simms High School.
"I feel really good about it,” he laughed. “My dad he used to truck so he remembers all the places. Like, he remembers where he was when he heard a specific song, so that's where I got it from."
Here’s the impressive part. How does he prepare for a bee?
“I don't,” he laughed. “It’s just picking up stuff from like social studies or anywhere else, I guess.”
In addition to just being really smart, he’s also creative and has a goal of one day becoming an engineer. He recently competed in the Science Olympiad.
"Me and a partner made a car that was powered by a mouse trap,” he said. “We got fifth. The last two years I built a device that detected water for our fields at home for irrigation. And we got it to email you when it detects water."
Next on the horizon is the state geography bee against middle schoolers from across Montana. As a sixth grader he finished seventh but had to skip the event last year. So now he has one final chance to claim a middle school state title.
Does he feel any nerves?
"Yeah, a little bit, but that's why I don't study because I don't think about it so much and just go in,” Rohrer said. “I'm better at winging it than anything else."
Rohrer will compete in the state geography bee on March 27 at Montana State University.
