OXFORD — An Oxford Hills Middle School student recently got a chocolate and steak sauce pie in the face by a pie-wielding chicken but it was all in good fun as the eighth-grade student faced off against other Maine students in a game show called “Kick Start.”

“It didn’t smell too good,” Cordell Leeman said Monday with a chuckle as he talked about his upcoming television appearance. Twenty-seven Maine students are competing for a $5,000 NextGen College Investing Plan prize.

Leeman was selected for the WPXT trivia game show “Kick Start” that airs every Thursday at 7:30 p.m. and is intended to be part of a larger initiative aimed at getting seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students thinking about college. The show is described as a sort of “Double Dare” meets “Jeopardy” format.

“We wanted to create a show that was fun for kids,” said John Marshall, the show’s creator, producer and host, in a statement released Monday.

But it wasn’t an easy job. “Most kids are very sophisticated TV watchers who have seen just about everything under the sun,” Marshall said. “Our challenge was to come up with a new twist on the game show idea. Something that would make them laugh and be strange enough to get their interest.”

Leeman said his mom saw the casting call advertisement in a newspaper last June and they went to the Westbrook television studio to audition. He answered several simple questions like what do you want to do when you grow up? Leeman’s response: a race car driver.

“I left (the audition) and waited and then the host John Marshall emailed my mom. Once I found out, it was three days before my birthday,” he said of the surprise he got this summer that he had been accepted to the show.

Leeman’s show was recorded in late August and will air at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 6, on Time Warner’s Channel 12 and Channel 51 on the Dish network.

Although he is not allowed to say if he won and will go on to the semifinals, Leeman said he did fail to answer at least one question right, which resulted in the shaving cream-based pie incident during one of the three rounds of questions.

Leeman, who enjoys acting in school plays such as last year’s middle school production of “The Emperor’s New Clothing,” said he hopes this is the just the start of a television career that will include getting booked on other game shows or even making television commercials.

In addition to acting, Leeman enjoys science and “especially lunch.”

He hopes to attend college and study video design.

Former Maine Commissioner of Education Susan A. Gendron endorsed the goal of the TV show.

“If Maine wants increased economic prosperity for its citizens and the state, we need to focus on a bigger goal than ensuring students complete high school. We need to make sure Maine students graduate from high school ready for college, careers and citizenship,” Gendron said in a statement. “To reach that goal, we need to start preparing our children for success before they enter high school. That early engagement is at the heart of the ‘Kick Start’ approach.”

“Kick Start” is aired in partnership with NextGen, Maine’s Public Universities, Kepware Technologies, Sanford Institute for Savings and Phinney Lumber Co.

“I enjoyed it. It was really fun,” Leeman said of his television stint. He lives with his mom, Rebecca, dad, Tom, and older brother, Jacob, in Oxford.

ldixon@sunjournal.com

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