Southern Middle School Spelling Bee Held

SMS Spelling Bee Held

7th and 8th graders were given spelling quizzes in their English classes.  Due to their excellent scores on the spelling quizzes, 19 students were able to compete in the SMS Spelling Bee.

We are very proud of the 19 students:

Colin Baust-Crain

Colin Brusse

Tyler Burgess

Courtney Clark

Maria DePastina

Clara Gibson

Evan Kahl

David Koval

Benjamin Lonas

Elena Martin

Stephen Mayoryk

Michaela Mundis

Matt O’Brien

Isabella Polaski

Julia Polaski

Joshua Preston

Mateo Ramirez Snell

Bea Angela Ricafort

Stephan Smith

By round five, there were  8 students left in the Bee. They were Colin Baust-Crain, Colin Brusse, Elena Martin, Clara Gibson, Michaela Mundis, Matt O’Brien, Joshua Preston, and Bea Angela Ricafort.

By round nine, we exhausted the Spelling Bee study list words and had ventured into the Greek study list. At this time Colin Baust-Crain, Colin Brusse, Elena Martin, Matt O’Brien and Bea Angela Ricafort were still in the competition. The students spelled very difficult study words such as “tergiversation” and “asthmogenic”. The rounds continued and by round twelve Colin Baust-Crain, Matt O’Brien, and Bea Angela Ricafort battled it out for the chance to be the 1st place champion.

In round 16, only Matt O’Brien and Bea Angela Ricafort were left competing. The two exhausted all the study words and additional words had to be used that were not on the study list by round 16. In order for a student to be champion of the Spelling Bee, he/she has to spell a word correctly when all other students spell their words incorrectly.  They then must spell an additional championship word correctly. In round 20, Matt O’Brien spelled incorrectly the word “nicety” and that allowed Bea a chance to possibly win the championship. Bea Angela Ricafort became the 1st place champion after she successfully spelled the word “guaranteed” and then the championship word “ivory”.

Bea Angela Ricafort, an 8th grader, placed 1st and won an online Encyclopedia Britannica.  Matt O’Brien, an 8th grader, placed second. Colin Baust-Crain placed third and Colin Brusse placed fourth. All four champions of the Southern Middle School Spelling Bee have been invited to Harrisburg to further their spelling quest with a semi-final regional Spelling Bee with students from 10 counties within Central Pennsylvania. The semi-final regional Spelling Bee will be a paper and pencil test at WITF in Harrisburg on January 20th.  The top spellers of this test will be in a televised Grand Championship Spelling Bee on February 3rd.

During the Spelling Bee, Mrs. Newland was the coordinator and judge, Megan Watkins was the pronouncer, Ethan Wright was the second judge, and both Michael Watkins and Jillian Bolio were scorekeepers.