A Butler Catholic student will head to Harrisburg next month to compete in the Pennsylvania State Geographic Bee.

Nathaniel Friel, a seventh grader, recently won the schoolwide bee and qualified for the state contest after receiving one of the top 100 scores on a written test given to school bee winners.

Nathaniel is the son of Matthew and Jennifer Friel.

The winner of the state competition on April 4 will compete in the National Geographic Bee in Washington, D.C.

The bee is associated with National Geographic magazine.

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Students at Butler Catholic School participated in the Pennsylvania Junior Academy of Science Regional Competition with winning results. Twelve of the 14 students received first place and will compete in the state competition in May.

The eighth grade students who received first place were Maggie Bartony, Anna Chiprean, Dante Grenci, Nicole Laborie, Emma LeMay, Erin LeMay and Matthew Nichol.

Dante also received a special award for junior high physics.

Seventh grade students who received first place were Tre Bartony, Logan Lindey, Mia Maher, Thomas Preston and Julia Singleton.

Second place went to eighth grader Kirsten Voelker and seventh grader Leah Bowden.

Julie Kasunic, a 10th grader at Knoch High School,received first and second place as well as a special award for computer science. Kasunic is a Butler Catholic graduate. She was sponsored by Jayne Chobot, Butler Catholic’s PJAS sponsor.

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San Francisco — Christian Heilman, a senior at Penn State University, placed seventh out of entries nationwide for The William Randolph Hearst Foundation’s 54th annual Journalism Awards Program’s Television Features Competition.

Penn State placed sixth of the 105 colleges and universities in the competition.

Heilman is a graduate of Freeport High School and recently returned from a Penn State international reporting trip to Cuba. He is the son of Glenn and Miriam Heilman of Freeport.

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INDIANA, Pa. — The Sutton Scholars academic achievement scholarship program at Indiana (Pa.) University announced recipients for the 2014-15 academic year, including the following students:

Alexia Montgomery, a senior at Union High School and the daughter of Janie Montgomery of Rimersburg. She plans to study nursing.

Katelyn Williams, daughter of Sam and Tammy Williams of Grove City and a senior at Grove City High School. She also plans to study nursing.

Freshman applicantswith very strong academic promise are chosen after a competitive interview process.

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SARVER — Valerie Delk, a senior at Freeport High School, is the 2014 Student of the Year for The Challenge Program.

Delk took home the program’s Academic Improvement Award for increasing her overall grade point average during her junior year of high school.

She was selected as Student of the Year from a pool of 1,470 award recipients from 122 high schools in Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio and West Virginia.

Delk is the daughter of Michael and Doreen Delk of Sarver.

Quality Life Services sponsored The Challenge Program at Freeport High School. The program provides students with incentives for success and motivates students to improve their performance in attendance, academic improvement, academic excellence, STEM excellence and community service.