BELAIR–Three of the five finalists headed to the Belair Community Centre to go head to head to determine the winner of the final round of the Rotary-Rotaract Spelling Bee 2018 are from St. Maarten: Nasya Gayle, Methodist Agogic Centre (MAC) John A. Gumbs Campus; Mikage Dorcelus, Ruby Labega Primary School; and Sameer Chatani, Seventh-Day Adventist School.
The other two are Zakkai Lake and Ayana Carty from the Anguilla schools.
These three girls and two boys were well supported by a large crowd of family, friends, classmates and teachers.
The spelling bee is held in three rounds. The first round, the Preliminary Round, had 29 participants from 14 schools. In this round the children had to write the selected 20 words on paper.
The 10 highest scorers in the Preliminary Round went on to the Semi-Finals. The 10 semi-finalists from eight schools had to spell out their words into a microphone in front of the judges and audience. The top five highest scorers from the Semi-Finals are headed on to the Final Round.
All 29 participants in the Rotaract Spelling Bee 2018 represented their respective schools admirably, according to the Rotary Club this week.
It was a very close finish for all five participants in the final round and there was a tie for third place. For the two girls with the third-place tie, their scores from the preliminary and semi-final rounds were calculated, which broke the tie by just one point.
In first place came Carty from Anguilla, who won the first-place trophy and an Apple iMac 21.5-inch desktop computer.
In second place came Lake, also from Anguilla, who received the second-place trophy and a 13.3-inch Apple MacBook Air.
In third place came Dorcelus of Ruby Labega Primary School. She received the third-place trophy and a 9.7-inch iPad 5th Generation.
In fourth place came Gayle of MAC John A. Gumbs Campus, who went home with a Samsung Galaxy J7 Neo cell phone.
Fifth place went to Chatani of Seventh Day Adventist School who got to take home a JBL Bluetooth Over-Ear Headphone and a fidget spinner.
The Anguilla schools won a printer for being the most supportive school. Also in attendance to support the semi-finalists were Selma Baker and other representatives of the main sponsor Scotiabank; Minister of Education, Culture, Youth and Sport Wycliffe Smith, who spoke with the participants before the start of the round; and Assistant District Governor (ADC) for District 7020 Marcellia Henry.
The Anguilla schools were also awarded a Dell Optiplex 3020 computer and an AOC. 1905 SWD 19-inch LED computer monitor as the prize for the winning school. Scotiabank presented all 29 participants with backpacks filled with goodies.
The 40-inch TV donated by Shop and Take was also raffled.
The five finalists were asked for their comments on the spelling bee, and these ranged from “it was good,” “it was fun,” “it was a lot of words,” and “they learnt many new words” to “there was a lot of studying that had to be done.”
Rotary-Mid Isle thanked Scotiabank, the main sponsor of the Rotary-Rotaract Spelling Bee 2018 along with gold sponsor Guardian Group Fatum and the many other sponsors without whose help it said it could not have had a successful spelling bee.
Source: The Daily Herald https://www.thedailyherald.sx/islands/82242-3-st-maarten-students-in-spelling-bee-finals
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