Ryan Fraser has a head for numbers

Eleven-year-old Ryan Fraser is a math wizard.

Ryan has been taking math classes at Northwood Middle School since fifth grade. During the 2006-‘07 school year, he was the top kid in the Math Is Cool program for fifth- and sixth-graders at Evergreen, doing ninth-grade math.

Ever since Ryan was little, he has loved math. He knew the multiplication table by first grade.

When he was in fourth grade, Ryan placed fourth in a regional math competition.

His mastery of the subject soon exceeded what Evergreen could offer him, so he began taking algebra classes designed for advanced seventh- and eighth-graders at Northwood before his own school started.

At a time when homework is a chore for most of his peers, Ryan is having a great time with math, asking for extras all the time. When he goes shopping with his parents, he asks for math books.

Asked how Ryan developed such a passion for mathematics, his parents, Dennis and Karen Fraser, seemed puzzled.

“Ryan has an older sister who is very good with math. We always have math books lying around the house. Maybe that helps,” his mother, an accountant, said.

This year, Ryan is being home-schooled by his parents and will be taking 10th-grade geometry. He hopes to take college math by the time he enters high school.

“Probability is my favorite area in math,” Ryan said. When he grows up, he says, he wants to have a job “that has something to do with math – a math professor maybe, or an engineer.”

Aside from his aptitude in math, Ryan is well-rounded. During his summer vacation, he read more than 70 books, including the whole series of Harry Potter books, which he reread before the last one was launched.

Ryan also is a member of the Spokane Waves swim team, practicing three evenings a week at Whitworth University.

Ryan says he is very competitive. “Studying is even more fun if it is for competition,” he said. “It gets me going.”

“We never push him. He pushes himself,” his mother said. “We just allow him to go as far as he can go.”

With his drive and passion, Ryan Fraser already is going very far from his peers.