Sauceda wins Junior High Bee
By John and Jaime Earp
This past Tuesday, November 19th, the 2024 Jal Junior High Spelling Bee was held in the Junior High Gym. The announcer and pronouncer for the Jal Junior High Spelling Bee was Miki Savoie. Judges were Vivian Nieto, Gina Muniz, and Paulean Gonzalez. Contestants in the Spelling Bee included Braxton Crow, Eli Maes, Grettel Portillo, Elijah Earp, Emma Aguirre, Steven Conway, Jayden Cervantes, Eloy Barrera, Caleb Carrales, Kynzie Sauceda, Jayten Butts, and Urijah Maes. Competition was good, but was over a little more quickly than past bees. Twelve rounds were completed before a winner was declared. Words that were used in the bee included “dunk,” “alone,” “please,” “nook,” “sign,” “straps,” “caves,” “jazzy,” “honking,” “trace,” “giraffe,” “groceries,” “huddling,” “jigsaw,” “neighbors,” “gasped,” “powwow,” “massive,” “handstand,” “leaking,” “snazzy,” “wean,” “sideways,” “muster,” “spiral,” “breathe,” “taxicab,” “scribbly,” “murky,” “quill,” “costume,” “village,” “dimple,” “reunion,” “severe,” “nonsense,” “champion,” “convince,” “speckled,” “hopscotch,” “naughty,” “interact,” “pivot,” “council,” “ointment,” “hurricane,” “argument,” and “magnolia,” with the winning word, “military,” being correctly spelled by Kynzie Sauceda, who won first place. Grettel Portillo was runner up, Jayden Cervantes came in third place, and Elijah Earp came in fourth.
