The Greater Hightstown Juniorettes held a spelling bee on Feb. 22 in the Rogers Elementary School auditorium in Hightstown, held in person after a cancellation last year due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The first place winner is Brennan Clissold, a fifth grader at Rogers. The second place winner is Syed Raza, a fifth grader at Drew Elementary School. The third place winner is Rishi Selvaraj, a fourth grader at Drew Elementary.
Runner up is Andrew Guzman.
The last word to end the spelling bee was “simplicity” after 26 rounds of play.
There were 39 students in total who participated: 27 from Drew and 12 from Rogers. Twenty-five were fourth graders, 14 were fifth graders.
The top three winners won $35, $25 and $15, respectively. They will now move on to the regional spelling bee in March, and winners of that round of competition will move on to the state spelling bee on April 9 at the New Jersey State Federation of Women’s Club’s headquarters in New Brunswick.
The spelling bee is sponsored by the New Jersey State Federation of Women’s Clubs.
Business sponsors were Dairy Queen in East Windsor, which provided free ice cream cones; and Popeye’s of East Windsor, which provided free chicken sandwiches.
The Greater Hightstown Juniorettes is a local community service group of young ladies ages 12-18. The club has been in service for 20 years.
- This information was provided by Cori Kenny of the Greater Hightstown Juniorettes.