Spelling champs — 3 Weston County students qualify for state spelling bee

A Newcastle Middle School student who figured she “might as well give it a try” is now among those who will compete in Scripps National Spelling Bee’s Wyoming competition when the event is held in Rock Springs in spring 2025.

Isabel Parsons placed second in the oral portion of the Nov. 25 cross-county spelling bee, which was held in Crouch Auditorium in Newcastle, and said in an email sent to the NLJ that she participated in the spelling bee because she was interested in trying something new.

She was one of 17 NMS students and three Upton Middle School students who made it on stage, according to her father Matthew Parsons, a teacher at UMS.

Twenty NMS students and six UMS students completed a 25-question written exam the morning of Nov. 25, said Carrie Manders, NMS activities director. The schools formerly took turns hosting what had once been an annual event for at least 10 years, but neither school has had a spelling bee since 2020.

Matthew Parsons said that students who passed a preliminary written exam on Nov. 13 received a packet of words that might be part of the spelling bee. Isabel said she practiced those words, especially those she believed would be the hardest to spell.

The morning of the spelling bee, students attended one or two classes before heading to the auditorium, where they took the written test. Then, they watched “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” while anticipating the judges’ decision of where “the cut-off line” would be. Students eventually learned whether they would be participating in the oral portion of the event and then were dismissed to lunch. When they returned, they were shuffled on stage to sit in chairs according to how they placed in the written test. Isabel was in the fourth chair.

Erin Pzinski was the orator for the oral portion of the competition, which began at 1 p.m. Pzinski is Weston County School District No. 1’s reading instructional facilitator.

After a few rounds, Newcastle’s Brenden Smith, who was in the first chair, emerged as the winner. (Ed. note: The News Letter Journal was unable to reach Smith’s family by press time.) Ashtyn Penfield, of Upton, placed third.

The word “burro” knocked out the most students, including Parsons and Penfield. Students confused the word with “burrow” or “bureau,” according to NMS English teacher Nikki Bartlett, who co-hosted the event with Manders.

Bartlett said she and Pzinski hope that, in future spelling bees, more students ask for the origin of the word. They believe that will help avoid such confusion.

“The option to do so was available this year, but no kids asked for the origin and just settled for the definition, or the word used in the sentence,” Bartlett said.

Parsons said she’s looking forward to the challenge of the state competition.

“I want to see how far I get,” she said.

Penfield said in an email that he also plans to go to state and that the event was his first time participating in a spelling bee.

“I was very nervous but I still tried my best!” he said.

He joined the competition because he both enjoys and excels at spelling.

“I love learning how to spell and learning the meaning and origin of words,” he said.

Bartlett said spelling bee participants were nervous, but she believes they had a positive experience.

“It’s a great opportunity for students to get out of their comfort zones and take on a unique challenge,” NMS Principal Tyler Bartlett said. “I think most adults would have some real fears about standing up on stage to try to spell difficult words in front of an audience.”

Nikki Bartlett said that whenever a student was eliminated, the students in the audience readily cheered for them, and she’s grateful that Manders brought the tradition back and that Parsons brought students from Upton.

“Is it too soon to say I’m already looking forward to doing this again next year?!” Bartlett said.

A video recording of the spelling bee can be found on the NLJ YouTube page.