Spelling bee winners front row left to right: Teddy Park, third place; Kevin Park, second place; Grange Simpson, first place. Second row: Mikayla Taggart, Lexy Webster, Arilyn Allred, Tiana Jensen, Miranda Corbin, Douglas (Robbie) Maughan, JR Jensen, back row: Victoria Nelson, Karely Urrutia, Jessica Walker and Aspen English. [Photo by Patsy Stoddard / Emery County Progress]

 

Twin seventh-graders Kevin and Teddy Park each placed in the top three at the Southeast Education Service Center’s SESC Regional Spelling Bee on Tuesday, March 4 at Green River High School.

Winning spellers from Emery, Grand, San Juan and Carbon counties participated in the event. San Juan’s Grange Simpson won the event, and will receive an all-expense-paid trip for two to Bee Week in Washington, D.C. from May 25 to May 31. Miranda Corbin, a sixth-grader at Helen M.Knight Elementary School, also competed in the event.

J.J. Grant from the Southeast Education Service Center welcomed everyone and introduced Chas DeWitt from the San Juan School District as the pronouncer for the event.

Grant said the words for the spelling bee come from the Merriam Webster third dictionary. Grant encouraged the students to practice their spelling year-round from the dictionary.

Simpson placed first and Grand’s Kevin Park placed second. Teddy Park took third place, edging out Carbon’s Victoria Nelson after both misspelled a word in the ninth round. Simpson will be going to Washington, D.C. to represent southeastern Utah at the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

Top spellers from four southeastern Utah counties competed on March 4