There’s not a Hall of Fame for reading competitions in Tennessee but if there were, Pegram’s Sarah Collier would be in it.
The Harpeth High School 10th grade student has won the Tristar Reads summer reading competition, and its $1,000 scholarship, a total of four times and she’s competing again this year where she could contend for a new category of overall reading winner.
Educational organization Tennesseans for Student Success operates Tristar Reads each summer as an encouragement for students to spend their summer break reading. The Tennessee Firefly is funded in part by Tennesseans for Student Success.
Collier initially heard about the summer competition from her mother who was working as a librarian in 2017. The then 5th grader entered the program’s elementary school division that year and won after reading more than 211 hours over the summer.
“I wanted to test myself to see how much I could read,” said Collier. “It just made me want to read more to see if I could beat that every single time.”
Collier did just that in 2019 by winning the competition’s middle school division as a 7th grader by reading 22,955 minutes over the summer.
“I love to read anytime, anywhere,” said Collier in an interview about her reading experiences in 2019. “I always have a book with me. It’s a great way to relax and escape from my 4 siblings. It helps entertain me when I have nothing else to do. It gives me ideas for art projects. It’s a great way to spend time outside, especially during the summer.”
Collier competed the following year and upped her summer reading total to 30,540 minutes, once again winning the middle school division. She then moved up to the high school division in 2021 and won it as well, reading more than 50 books.
“I just think it shows I can beat the goals I set for myself if you put your mind to it,” said Collier.
Collier says she prefers to read fantasy, adventure, and action novels and usually reads about 3 hours a day even when she’s not competing in Tristar Reads.
Tennesseans for Student Success (TSS) is running the competition this year from May 31 to August 8, 2022. All Tennessee students entering grades K-12 are eligible to participate. At the end of the summer, TSS will award a $1,000 college scholarship to the students who read the most in the below categories:
• One overall winner
• One elementary school student (K-4)
• One middle school student (5-8)
• One high school student (9-12)
“Reading even 20 minutes a day is a wonderful way to prevent the summer reading slide that too many students experience each year,” said Tennesseans for Student Success President and CEO Adam Lister. “Tristar Reads provides an opportunity to challenge students across the state to read each day and maintain their reading comprehension skills so they can return to school in the fall ready for the year ahead.”
For Collier, Tristar Reads has also been a profitable way to plan for her years ahead in college. She’s won $4,000 in scholarship money through the program and says that assistance will come in handy when she graduates.
“I have to pay for my own college so being able to start off with some money to get the things I need will be very helpful because I’m going to be working to get my own money,” said Collier. “Having that start will be very helpful in the future.”
