Dist. 15 Spelling Bee champ moves onto regional championship

Rutvi Parikh, a fifth-grader at Virginia Lake School, qualified for the Regional Championship ISC Scripps Spelling Bee, where she will compete for a chance to advance to the 88th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee.

Rutvi won the District 15 Spelling Bee, which was held Jan. 22, at Walter R. Sundling Junior High, and took second at the Suburban Cook Northern Area Spelling Bee, which was held February 3 at Joseph Sears School in Kenilworth.

Rutvi won the District 15 Spelling Bee in the 17th round by correctly spelling adagio. Second-place finisher Sarah Stapleton, an eighth-grader from Plum Grove Junior High, went back and forth with Rutvi for six rounds before misspelling verboten.

Rutvi and Sarah both won their respective school spelling bees to advance to the district competition, as did 17 other students: Roshni Arun, grade five, Jane Addams School; Calvin Franke, grade four, Central Road School; Brooklynn Hextall, grade four, Kimball Hill School; Reetika Sharma, grade six, Marion Jordan School; Keyana Desai, grade six, Hunting Ridge School; Michael McGinn, grade six, Thomas Jefferson School; Shivani Jayswal, grade six, Lake Louise School; Guntaas Kaur, grade four, Lincoln School; Sumana Dara, grade six, Stuart R. Paddock School; Arnan Gangla, grade five, Gray M. Sanborn School; Shreya Seetharam, grade four, Pleasant Hill School; Arin Lee, grade five, Frank C. Whiteley School; Sravya Konasani, grade six, Willow Bend School; Laura Seeberger, grade six, Winston Campus Elementary; Chandrachur Kesana, grade eight, Carl Sandburg Junior High; Tim Okonek, grade eight, Walter R. Sundling Junior High; and Luis Hernandez, grade eight, Winston Campus Junior High.

As one of the Suburban Cook Northern Area Spelling Bee's top three finishers, Rutvi qualified to advance to the Regional Championship ISC Scripps Spelling Bee, which will be held Thursday, Feb. 19, at McClure Junior High School in Western Springs. There she will compete against the top-three finishers from the Northern, Southern, and Western Suburban Cook Spelling Bees for an all-expenses-paid trip to the Washington, D.C., area at the end of May to participate in the 88th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee.

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