Zoey Dennis had a bit of anxiety waiting for her Round 2 word in the Akron Beacon Journal’s regional spelling bee. Then, that’s exactly what she had to spell.
A-N-X-I-E-T-Y, she recited, letter by letter, swaying slightly with her hands clasped behind her back.
“I thought it was funny,” Zoey, a Hyre Community Learning Center eighth grader, said Sunday afternoon. “I thought that it fit how I felt.”
Zoey — who wore jeans, a custom spelling bee sweatshirt and copious amounts of glitter — was one of four Akron Public Schools students to make it to the regional bee. It was the first time in decades APS participated in the competition, which sends one regional winner to the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C., in May.
This year, that winner was Esther Lin, a Revere Middle School student who took the top prize by correctly spelling “nutation.” She’d previously spelled “mecca” correctly after second-place finisher Lucas Lebo, from Black River Middle School in Sullivan, misspelled “diocese.”
Esther misspelled “vaudeville” before her winning word, but regional bee coordinator Laura Kessel said Esther was the champion because she’d gotten that word wrong in a round in which she was the only competitor still standing.
Rylan Milford, a Wadsworth Middle School student, placed third.
The auditorium at the main branch of the Akron-Summit County Public Library on Sunday was full of parents, coaches and other supporters who clapped and cheered for students as they misspelled words, then exited the competition. That support was meaningful for Zoey, who was eliminated on a word she’d never heard before — “phraseology.”
When she heard the applause, Zoey said, the ringing of the bell that indicated a misspelling didn’t sting as much.
“That’s not so bad,” she said. “This was a lot of fun.”
Spelling bee valuable: ‘They gave their best effort’
That’s what APS administrators were hoping for when they decided to rejoin the spelling bee, which is celebrating 101 years. A student representing the Akron Beacon Journal has been part of the competition every year the national spelling bee has taken place (the competition did not occur for three years during World War II and one during the COVID-19 pandemic).
And an APS student participated in that first national bee.
“These are hallowed grounds,” Kessel, the regional bee coordinator, said of Akron’s spelling bee connection.
Carla Chapman, APS’ chief of community relations and strategic engagement, said participating in the competition was valuable for students who made it to the regional bee as well as for those who competed at the school level.
“Our students won’t have any understanding of what the possibility is if they don’t have the opportunity to participate,” Chapman said. “I’m proud of them. They gave their best effort.”
Preparing for the spelling bee is good preparation for the rest of students’ lives, too, said Barbara Sykes, the president of the Akron Board of Education. Sykes said the students who were on stage had to commit to studying long before they knew what the outcome might be.
“They saw it through to the end,” she said. “They set such a positive example.”
And the students saw the benefits, too. Zoey said that, before the competition, she was nervous to see so many people watching her from the audience.
Now, she feels like she’s confident enough at a microphone to give a speech on stage.
“Being exposed to something helped a lot,” she said.
He’s proud of his daughter, the winner of the Akron schools spelling bee
Imira Destiny Cobb, a Litchfield CLC eighth grader, won the APS district bee late last month. She was eliminated at the regional bee on “forgeable,” a word she said she was “so confident” she spelled correctly before she heard the bell.
Her father, Larelle Cobb, blamed himself. He said they had focused on spelling more complicated words. But he was still proud of his daughter.
“Honestly, why wouldn’t he be?” Imira quipped.
Imira, who also wore the custom sweatshirt APS created for the competitors, and distinctive anime-inspired cat-eye eyeliner, said after her district victory she wanted to try to continue in the competition.
After all, she got donuts and a new plush collectible, Zimomo, for her last victory.
“To be honest, I’m satisfied with winning the district bee and I don’t really mind losing this one,” Imira said after she was eliminated at the regional level. “I felt like that was enough for me.”
Imira and Zoey, as eighth graders, can’t compete in the spelling bee next year. But the two other APS competitors — Amelia Loretitsch and Naomi Cooper — can.
This Akron student wants to qualify again: ‘I hope I can come back next year’
Amelia, a seventh grader at Miller South School for the Visual and Performing Arts who is in theater, said she imagined herself on stage playing someone who was participating in a spelling bee — and who was probably going to fail. She misspelled “teamwork,” even though she called it an easy word.
“My brain just went blank,” she said. “I didn’t snap out of it until I got down.”
Amelia, who was also wearing the APS spelling bee shirt, said she was still caught up on “mosque,” the word she misspelled to be eliminated from the district bee.
Now, Amelia said, it’s one she’ll never forget.
And after spelling “considerable” and “astronaut” correctly at the regional bee, it was “stratosphere” that felled Naomi.
The Buchtel CLC seventh grader, who wore a bee necklace and a long skirt covered in sparkly butterflies, was called the best dressed on stage by one audience member.
Misspelling was disappointing, Naomi said, but she felt relieved, too. There was a lot of tension in the room — and even though Naomi was more at ease at the regional bee than the district bee where she finished second , she said if she had stayed in longer, the stress might have amped up.
Instead, she swung her arms at her sides as she spelled, forgoing the long pauses that tested the nerves of a pair of grandmothers who watched her at the district level. The newfound ease was because she had studied more, she said.
Naomi said she loves to spell and particularly appreciates the relief she feels when she gets a word right.
Some of the other 35 students from Summit, Wayne, Portage and Medina counties knew words she didn’t, Naomi said, but that’s just motivation to work hard to try to get to Washington, D.C.
“I’m not bad, I’m not sad,” she said after she was eliminated. “I hope I can come back next year and do it. It’s fun.”