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Spelling bee a great experience

To the editor:

I would like to take a moment to thank the Herald-Star, Amtrak, Uniglobe Travel, Huntington Bank, Eastern Gateway Community College, the Rotary Club of Steubenville, the Ohio Lottery Commission, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Amazon and Merriam-Webster, who were the sponsors of the Jefferson-Harrison County Regional Spelling Bee, for the all-expenses-paid trip to Washington, D.C., and for all of the other prizes I received for winning the bee. I would also like to thank all of the businesses and individuals who placed ads in the Herald-Star’s “Congratulations” and “Good Luck” pages. Competing in the National Spelling Bee was a great experience.

The trip was a lot of fun for my family and me. We had the opportunity to see many of the memorials and historic places in Washington, and I made new friends whom I shall hopefully see next year. The competition was very suspenseful, and with every second that passed I became more and more nervous. I was, however, eliminated in the preliminaries due to my score on the dictionary computer test and vocabulary computer test. I tied for 43rd place with approximately 150 other people out of 281 people.

Now that this spelling bee is over, I must start studying for the next one. I will study harder, and I will pay more attention to the definitions and spellings of words and word roots.

I will do my best to make it to the National Spelling Bee again, and this time, I am determined to win it. Sadly, it will be my last year to be eligible to participate in spelling bees.

In closing, I would like to thank the Herald-Star and the other sponsors of the Jefferson-Harrison County Regional Spelling Bee for a wonderful academic competition.

Nathan (J.T.) Keenan

Toronto

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