Lyon County Bee lasts quite a spell
Nishat Yasmin is victor in 17 rounds
By Brandy Nance
Saturday, February 16, 2008
OLPE — “Q-U-O-T-A-T-I-O-N.”
That is the word that made eighth-grader Nishat Yasmin of Emporia Middle School the Lyon County Spelling Bee champ at the competition Friday morning at Olpe Elementary School.
Nishat hung in for a whopping 17 rounds — more than two hours of spelling. Last year’s spelling bee only went for 12 rounds.
Nishat faced off with fellow Emporia Middle School student Mary Miller, who dropped out on the word “interrogation.” At that point, Nishat had to spell Miller’s missed word correctly plus one additional word correctly to win the spelling bee.
Throughout the spelling bee, students who misspelled words left the seating area and returned to the audience. When only two students remained, the rules changed. If a contestant misspelled a word, the other contestant had the opportunity to spell it.
The spelling bee kicked off with the national anthem, followed by a practice round. Following the practice round, the spelling bee began.
The first word of the competition was “flesh.” Two thirds of the way through the first round all 36 spellers representing 12 area schools were still in the game. After that, three spellers dropped out on the words “turkey,” “ache” and “flea.”
Rounds three and four saw many students retiring from their chairs as a total of 15 words were misspelled in the two rounds. By the sixth round, nerves were starting to fray and spellers were getting fidgety as they walked up to the microphone and while waiting for their turn.
Rounds seven, eight and nine only saw a few more spellers retire. There were no misspelled words during rounds 10 and 11. By round 13, however, there were only four participants left. It was down to the final two — Nishat and Mary by round 16, which was just prior to 11:30 a.m. — more than two hours after the spelling bee started. Nishat and Mary grimaced when they were informed a break would be taken. They laughed and talked about the event during the break.
But it was back to business after the break. Both competitors stood next to the microphone to prevent them from having to run back and forth.
When Mary missed on “interrogation,” it was up to Nishat, who spelled the missed word correctly. Nishat then spelled the winning word, “quotation,” quickly. She beamed as she was declared the winner and received a high-five from Mary.
Nishat is the daughter of Mohammad and Shireen Chowdhury. Since Nishat is an eighth-grader, this was her last chance to compete. She wanted to do it last year, but was sick, she said.
Nishat explained what it was like to win.
“Oh my gosh,” she said right after the competition. “I’m still kinda jittery. I did not expect to come this far.”
Nishat said the hardest word for her was the word “lacquer.”
“I’m sure I’ve lacquered lots of things, but I’ve never seen the word,” she said, laughing.
Bill Warner, principal at Olpe Elementary School and Neosho Rapids Elementary School was Nishat’s principal when she attended Village Elementary School in Emporia.
“I’m really proud of her,” Warner said, adding that it’s always a nice thing to follow students’ successes. “She was one of my favorite students when she was at Village. She’s a neat kid.”
Nishat now heads to the regional spelling bee, which will be on March 15 at Washburn Rural High School, 5900 S.W. 61st Street, Topeka.
Friday’s spelling bee was judged by Michelle Barnhart, Becky Clopton and Carolyn Turney. The pronouncer was Deanne Korsak.
tzkmom (anonymous) says...
I would like to see more of the kids' names who went. They all worked hard to get there, if they placed first or last. Nothing from the ones who won but third and fourth, etc would like to see their names in the paper too. They had to win at their school to even be there. :^)
February 16, 2008 at 11:57 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
esugrad_03 (anonymous) says...
The third place finisher is currently a student at one of the schools in which Mr. Warner is principal of. I agree with tzkmom, the names of the other top finishers should be placed in the newspaper.
February 17, 2008 at 7:30 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )