Cathedral City student eliminated from National Spelling Bee
A Cathedral City eighth-grader who won the Riverside County Spelling Bee in March has been eliminated from the 88th Scripps National Spelling Bee after advancing to the semifinals, according to Palm Springs Unified School District spokeswoman Joan L. Boiko.
Jenna-May Ingall is a student at James Workman Middle School. She won the Riverside County bee in the 39th round by correctly spelling the word “agama.” Ingall advanced past the second round at the national spelling bee after correctly spelling ‘barabara’. Barbara is a sod or turf hut in northern Siberia or Alaska.
Ingall then made it past the third round Wednesday evening to get into the semifinals, which were held from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Thursday. The championship round takes place Thursday evening.
The national competition began on Tuesday with preliminary testing. According to Scripps National Spelling Bee’s website, there was a total of 285 spellers competing this year.
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Contestants who spelled their third-round word correctly could be among the maximum of 50 spellers who advanced to Thursday’s semifinals if their score on the multiple-choice spelling and vocabulary test taken on Tuesday was high enough.
So, Jenna-May advancing to the semifinals was quite a feat on its own when considering how many gifted contestants were already eliminated from the competition.
Winning Words from National Spelling Bee
Jenna-May won the PSUSD spelling bee in each of the past five years but placed third in the 2014 county bee, Boiko said.
Two dozen Riverside County youngsters tested their word power in the county’s 38th annual Spelling Bee at the Moreno Valley Conference and Recreation Center in March. The students were from 18 school districts, two college preparatory schools, two private academies, a charter school and the Pechanga Band of Luiseno Indian Reservation’s elementary school.
The Scripps National Spelling Bee began on May 24 at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland.
News Channel 3 and CBS Local 2 congratulate Jenna-May on her tremendous accomplishment and wish her the best in the future.
