Nearly three dozen Berkeley County students were on stage at Berkeley High School on Thursday night, competing for two hours in the Berkeley County Spelling Bee.Â
Half were eliminated in the first two rounds, but the rest of the competitors made it a long evening of consonants and vowels.
The finalists were Haven Xu of College Park Middle School and Avery Carhart of Daniel Island School. Carhart won by correctly spelling aardwolf and neapolitan.
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Pronouncer Kathleen Bounds, a former Berkeley School Board chairwoman, said the contestants were particularly strong this year. "Tonight was a marathon," she said.
The top 12 spellers will compete at the regional spelling bee, Spellbound!,on March 22 at Charleston Southern University.
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Students who qualified for the county bee included (*qualified for regional bee March 22):
- Austin Berg
- Ian Bongalonta*
- Brittany Britton
- Malik Brown*
- Tolmann Burbage
- Avery Carhart (winner, Daniel Island School)*
- Halley Clearly
- Hayley Durant*
- Zach Ferguson
- Ethan Fry
- Jonathan Gerena
- Emma Gibson
- Michelle Guerry
- Jamie Jackson
- Tawandre Joseph*
- Joshua Lewis
- Nicholle Lewis*
- Breanna Lundblad*
- Jenna Maas
- Trevis McDaniel
- Michelle McKinney
- Ja'Quan McKnight
- Charlize Melendez*
- Drew Peavy*
- LaJ'ai Reed
- Charles Ritter*
- Montekius Shaw
- Ethan Smith*
- Kiley Thompson
- Carrie Tomberlin
- Michael Unbewust
- Jasmine Waring
- Gabe Wadford
- James Watson
- Lawrence Whaley
- Anthony Wigfall
- Haven Xu (runner-up, College Park Middle)*
Alternates included:
- Aaron Bradley
- Kate Fullero
- A-Jah Geathers
- Zelphair Grant
- Dwayne Howell
- Nicole Irving
- Lukas Kiezer
- My'Asia McCollum
- Marquez Milligan
- Anna Navarro
- Shamel Prioleau
- Dallas Stephens
- Jayrade Villenueva
- K'shawn Wiggins
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