The following story and video originally appeared on WBKO-DT 13 in Bowling Green, KY as part of the station’s weekly “View from the Hill” segment.
Six Gatton Academy Class of 2011 members are attending the camp: Anthony Bombik, Anthony Bates, Suzanne VanArsdall, Taylor Harbin, Michael Bowie, and Corban Coffman.
More than 200 of the nation’s brightest students are spending part of their summer getting even smarter at Western Kentucky University.
VAMPY stands for Verbally And Mathematically Precocious Youth.
It’s been around for 26 years, and students say they can’t get enough of it.
So what is it about VAMPY camp that seventh through tenth graders love?
For six hours every day, students find themselves in classrooms – for example one class is forensic chemistry, where every day they try to solve a crime scene.
Center for Gifted Studies Director Julia Roberts started the camp in 1984 as Duke University’s very first cooperative program.
The camp has grown from 40 students the first year, to 215 in 2009.
This will be Hallie Bates last year to attend VAMPY, and she says it’s both the knowledge and the friendships that make it so special.
“The best thing? I’m not sure if it’s the classes or the friendships. Both of my brothers came here, and are still friends even though they are about to graduate college.”
VAMPY, which wraps up next week, is also the perfect venue to tout Kentucky’s prestigious Carol Martin Gatton Academy of Math and Science on WKU’s campus.
The Gatton Acadamy was recently listed on Newsweek’s 2009 list of the Public Elites.
