Western Springs will be well represented when the regional finals of the Scripps Spelling Bee take place next week at McClure Junior High School.
Two of the three individuals advancing from the West 40 Cook County Bee are from Western Springs. Bernadette Miao, an eighth-grader from St. John of the Cross School, and Mira Dedhia, a sixth-grader from McClure, will both be in the contest.
Audrey Santora, an eighth-grader from Komarek School in North Riverside, is the third regional representative to emerge from the West 40 competition, which was held Feb. 5 at McClure.
“I was a little nervous, but I was able to stay calm,” said Miao, who out-spelled Santora in the 14-round competition to take the bee’s top honors.
Dedhia took third place.
With each of the three girls’ place secured in regionals after the eighth round, it was not until the 11th round that Dedhia was knocked out on “abject,” an adjective meaning extremely bad, unpleasant and degrading.
The McClure sixth-grader said she spent about 90 minutes a night on top of her regular homework to go over spelling.
“I will probably take even more time to get ready for regionals,” said Dedhia, who noted there are 14 pages of potential words from which Scripps chooses.
More Top Picks Balance Board
Her parents, Sunil and Lekshmi, beamed after the event.
“We are very excited for her,” said Lekshmi, who helped her daughter study. “She has been working toward the spelling bee for months. She worked hard, studying the words on top of her normal course work.
“This work comes very naturally for her. I am very happy for her.”
The winner of the regional bee, which will take place at 7 p.m. Feb. 19 at McClure, and a parent will get a trip to the national Scripps Spelling Bee in Washington D.C.
Dedhia will be looking to make it a three-peat for McClure, following in the footsteps of Alia Abiad, who went to the nation’s capital the last two years. Abiad finished sixth in the nation last year after tying for 19th in 2013.
Abiad, now a freshman at St. Ignatius College Prep, was on hand at the West 40 bee to watch the competition and congratulate the winners. She said the contest brought back memories.
“It was amazing,” Abiad said of her two trips to Washington D.C. “I enjoyed those trips so much. To be part of that group on the national level was great.”
Abiad, who said her spelling bee days are over, advised the area’s three regional competitors not to change study patterns now.
“Keep on studying. Keep doing what they’re doing,” Abiad advised. “What they are doing has worked pretty well so far.”
Miao said she was pretty confident of the words she was given.
“But when I got ‘wicket’ (equipment used in cricket), I was not sure,” Miao said of the word she got in round 13.
The St. John of the Cross eighth-grader said she may spend two hours a day getting ready for the regional competition. She said she spent about an hour a day prepping for the West 40 bees.