Ward Three Bees win Northampton spelling bee with medical term
The Ward Three Bees claimed victory after correctly spelling a brain-part term that stumped their rivals in the final round.
NORTHAMPTON — The "Ward Three Bees" won the 24th Northampton Education Foundation Adult Spelling Bee on Wednesday by correctly spelling "rhombencephalon," a part of the brain that controls vital functions like breathing and heart rate. The winning team of James Pentland, Ellie Cook, and Kim Goggins competed against "Apis Wilsonava" in the final round after advancing through five earlier stages called "swarms."
The spelling bee, held at Bombyx Center for Arts & Equity in Florence, raised an estimated $13,000 to $15,000 for the Northampton Education Foundation's Small Grants to Educators program. This program funds teaching and learning initiatives in Northampton Public Schools and Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School. The foundation has raised more than $1.5 million since 1991.
Both finalist teams struggled with "lobscouse," a traditional Northern European stew, before both correctly spelled "genetrix," meaning a mother or female ancestor, and "Leine," a river in Germany. Apis Wilsonava misspelled the winning word by using an "a" in place of the second "e." Pentland said the victory felt "very nice, very unexpected" and that the first swarm featured especially difficult words.
Cook, who along with Pentland had won the spelling bee in 2015 as members of the Daily Hampshire Gazette team, said she was startled by the difficulty of early rounds. "I just couldn't believe how hard the words were in the beginning," she said. The first swarm included words such as "temerarious" and "ventripotent."
The roughly 100-minute event also featured a costume contest won by Brian Garrard of "The Bee Team," who wore a fuzzy yellow bee suit from head to toe. Students from the Northampton High School Student Union team won honey and gift cards for writing the most humorous messages on their dry-erase boards after elimination, with entries like "pick on someone your own size" and "We're just larvae."
Megan Zinn, the event organizer known as the "queen bee," said the enthusiasm of participants has kept her involved for more than a decade. "My favorite part is the enthusiasm for it; how much everybody enjoys being here, enjoys doing the costumes, enjoys the humor up on the stage," Zinn said. Ward Three City Councilor Laurie Loisel, whose campaign sponsored the Ward Three Bees, said she wanted to help bring community together in the ward. "I knew this team would go far," Loisel said.