Blindness Isn’t Stopping This 15-Year-old H.S. Senior’s Quest For Knowledge

WAYZATA, Minn. (WCCO) – When the Wayzata Science Bowl team practices, they mean business. They just won the state championship, and they are now getting ready for nationals in Washington, D.C.

They’re all smart kids, that’s obvious, but one of them stands out — team captain Nathan Stocking.
“The other team gets intimidated,” said teammate Jayant Chaudhary, “because he doesn’t even need paper for pretty complex complications.”

Stocking is a high school senior, even though he’s only 15 years old.

“Whether it’s speaking Spanish or Chinese, or if it’s programming computer scripts, or if it’s knowing every detail about a science subject, he excels in all of them,” said teacher Amanda Laden.
But something else is different about Stocking. He can’t see.

“I think he was born smart,” says his mother, Karen Cotch. “He just thrives on knowledge…and we’re just the ones who try to find ways to feed it.”

Stocking lost his sight when he was only a few months old, but he’s been amazing people ever since.
“At around 8, he started taking middle school classes,” she said. “His first A.P. class, he was 11, and he went to the high school for that.”

Now, he’s only at the high school for science bowl. His college-level classes are all online or through special instructors.

“I never really had a formal grade until this year,” he said.

And then there’s his music….

Read the rest here.

Yes, that “Amanda” is my Amanda!