BCPS crowns the district spelling bee winner

Students dusted off their dictionaries and leveled up their lexicons for the Burke County Public Schools (BCPS) Spelling Bee this week, enduring more than an hour of letter-by-letter battles of wit.

Following several sets of slumped shoulders, hung heads, and even a few tears, Table Rock Middle School seventh grader Riley Street took home the trophy with the word “aeronautics.”

“I’m kind of excited,” Riley said, holding the shiny trophy with both hands. “But also, a little relieved after that, because this is the third time I’ve been up on that stage.”

According to Riley’s parents, she’s an avid reader and a determined competitor.

“This is the third time she’s made it to the county,” Riley’s father, J.D. Street, said, holding a bouquet of flowers that BCPS Superintendent Mike Swan presented to the winner’s parents on stage. “She finally knocked it out this time.”

“She said, ‘Third time’s the charm,’” Riley’s mother, Britt Street, said. “She was right.”

Each competitor brought their own unique style to the nerve-racking act of spelling in front of a crowd, approaching the two height-adjusted microphones and often choosing the one they had to bend down to.

Some were timid and quietly worked their way through each letter. Some asked for the word’s origin, hitting each letter precisely after learning whether it was Greek or Latin. One student traced words in the air with her finger, mimicking the act of writing.

Riley’s tactic often included requesting the definition or that the word be used in a sentence, rattling off the letters with confidence after Director of Elementary Education Dr. Brett Wilson gave the syntactic example.

With each advanced round, parents in the crowd muttered their impressed approval: “That’s a big word” and “Is that how that’s spelled?” Some stuck to the universally exasperated “shoo,” exhaling through their teeth at the multisyllabic gymnastics.

One by one, students slipped up on words like diagrammatic, architecture, and amphibious — the detrimental nail in the coffin for Riley’s final opponent, thus securing her win.

Riley said she wasn’t particularly concerned over any of the words, because she had spent plenty of time preparing.

“I copied down half of the entire packet for the words they gave us, and they only used one that I’d copied down,” she said, chuckling at the irony.

When Wilson uttered the word “aeronautics,” Riley went over her trademark spiel, asking for the definition. As Wilson said, “The science of flight and aircraft design,” a smile crept across Riley’s face.

“A-E-R-O-N-A-U-T-I-C-S,” she spelled without pause. “Aeronautics.”

“And that is our Spelling Bee champion,” Wilson announced. “I was getting very nervous. We were getting close to the end of our list … That tells us we need about five more rounds next year.”