Spelling Bee winner Kyle Vidad and Blatchley Language Arts teachers (and Bee judges) Alexander Allison, Janelle Farvour, and Emily Demmert. (KCAW photo/Robert Woolsey)
In what was one of the most tightly-contested spelling bees in recent memory, 27 grade-level finalists at Blatchley Middle School in Sitka spelled their way to word no. 208 on the official Scripps National Spelling Bee list Wednesday night (1-15-14). In the end it boiled down to eighth-grader Kyle Vidad and defending champion Abigail Fitzgibbon. The two went head-to-head for eight rounds, until Fitzgibbon tripped on “matriculation” and Vidad successfully spelled “smithereens” to win the round, and then “aerodynamic” to win the championship. Test a friend on these words Abby and Kyle spelled with nearly one-hundred fans looking on:
Abby: charioteer
Kyle: netiquette
Abby: panache
Kyle: recoup
Abby: abstruse
Kyle: prognosticate
Abby: ostracism
Kyle: monochrome
Abby: aficionado
Kyle: bloviate
Abby: pariah
Kyle: bazooka
Abby: cavalier
Kyle: juxtapose
Abby: matriculation (spelled incorrectly)
Kyle: smithereens
Kyle: aerodynamic (championship word)
Vidad won a copy of the Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary, and the opportunity to represent Sitka at the state spelling bee in Anchorage on February 28, 2014. As one exhausted fan in Kettleson Library noted after the event, “There was electricity in the room!”
