Fifty-eight spellers have earned a place in the 34th annual Daily Item Regional Spelling Bee on March 13 at Lynn City Hall Memorial Auditorium.
The winner will earn a place at the Scripps National Spelling Bee, which will begin on May 27 at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in Fort Washington, Maryland, just outside Washington D.C.
The 58 spellers were the top scorers for a written preliminary test to the Regional Spelling Bee, sponsored by the Daily Item and Joel and Mary Abramson.
Of those finalists, four students achieved a perfect score on the test: Rohit Paradkar, John D. Runkle School, Brookline; Lena Le, Paul Revere School; Taranpreet Singh, Higgins Middle School, Peabody, Zayana Nadeau, Marblehead Community Center, Marblehead.
The test was deemed necessary due to the drastic increase in participation for this year’s event. Running a spelling bee for all students put forward from 110 schools would have been much too time consuming.
For the test, each speller was given 40 words to spell by a faculty member from their school and were allowed to ask questions, such as the origin of the word, part of speech and use in a sentence. The first 20 words came from the Scripps 2019 list of words, with the next 20 coming from Scripps or the dictionary.
The winners are:
Joshua LeGrand, Briggs Elementary, Ashburnham; Ashlinn Broderick, Overlook Middle School, Ashburnham; April Rust, Page Hilltop School, Ayer; Chloe Mitchell, Florence Sawyer School, Bolton; Rohit Paradkar, John D Runkle, Brookline; Trisha Cherukuri , Wm H Galvin Middle, Canton; Isha Patel, Holten Richmond Middle School, Danvers; Marcus Irwin, St. Johns Preparatory School, Danvers.
Allison Maheux, Bird Middle, East Walpole; Ina Soini, St. Bernard’s Elementary School, Fitchburg; Catherine Koran, Foxborough Regional Charter School, Foxborough; Lily Eattimo, Benjamin Franklin Classical Charter Public School, Franklin; Jack Peterson, John G Whittier, Haverhill; Gavin Anderson, South Elementary, Hingham; Hansika Kommanavancha, Luther Burbank Middle School, Lancaster; Daniel Nelson, Johnny Appleseed, Leominster; Lillian Wyckoff, Sky View Middle School, Leominster; Audric Adonteng, St. Anna School, Leominster; Katherine McDonagh, Littleton Middle School, Littleton; Ranjana Ramesh, Ste Jeanne D’arc Elementary School, Lowell; Kieran Lunn, Lunenburg Middle-High School (6-12), Lunenburg; Aliya Holden, Turkey Hill Elementary, Lunenburg.
Reem Ahrabar, Aborn, Lynn; Julian Jarjour, Breed Middle School, Lynn; Amelia Stank, Capt William G Shoemaker, Lynn; Arianis Garcia, Edward A Sisson, Lynn; Cody Maguire, Julia F Callahan, Lynn; Daileny Torres, Thurgood Marshall Middle, Lynn.
Julia Ho, Lynnfield Middle School, Lynnfield; Zayana Nadeau, Marblehead Community Charter Public School, Marblehead; Massimo Bottari, Marblehead Veterans Middle School, Marblehead; Ella Benedetto, Village School, Marblehead.
Sylvie Benson, Old Rochester Regional Junior High, Mattapoisett; James Carven, Fowler School, Maynard; Elizabeth Glaeser, Montrose School, Medfield; Mahnoor Kazi, The Islamic Academy For Peace, Methuen; Shaylan Chawda, Delphi Academy, Milton.
Collette Heil, Johnson, Nahant; Maegan Horrigan, Monsignor Haddad Middle School, Needham; Joseph Masterson, St. Michael Elementary School, North Andover; Alexandra Ning, Norwell Middle School, Norwell; Maxine Crays, South Shore Charter Public School, Norwell.
Toni Asenuga, Covenant Christian Academy, Peabody; Taranpreet Singh, Higgins Middle School, Peabody; Rana Mrabbi, Beachmont Veterans Memorial School, Revere; David Kossol Rorth, Garfield Elementary School, Revere; Teo Hood, Garfield Middle School, Revere; Sara Granados, Hill Elementary School, Revere; Lena Le, Paul Revere, Revere; Hakim Malki, Rumney Marsh Academy, Revere; Gavin Rua, Susan B. Anthony Middle School, Revere.
Seamus Swift, Rockport Middle, Rockport; Beatrix Martin-Epstein, Clarke, Swampscott; Ananya Pinnamaneni, Academy Of Notre Dame, Tyngsboro; Arjav Akkole, Eleanor N Johnson Middle, Walpole; John Gengozian, Our Ladys Academy, Waltham; Perry Whitmore, Day Elementary, Westford; Jayden Barnaby-Feldhus, Westminster Elementary, Westminster.
