Scotiabank Rotary-Rotaract Spelling Bee Plans Underway
Another summer vacation has ended and while the students are settling back into the classroom, some students aged 9-10 years will be preparing for the annual Scotiabank Rotary-Rotaract Spelling Bee Competition, which the main organizer ‘The Rotary Club of St. Maarten-Mid Isle’ has been planning for the last ten months. The main sponsor for the Spelling Bee is Scotiabank. The event will start with the preliminaries on Sunday October 13th. Unfortunately, the Spelling Bee was cancelled into 2017 due to the passing of Hurricanes Irma and Maria.
The objective of this Spelling Bee is to improve literacy and enhance the students’ educational experience. With Scotiabanks’ commitment, Mid Isle are confident that this year’s Spelling Bee will be successful once again.
All three events are being held at ‘The Belair Community Center’. The Rotary Club of St. Maarten-Mid Isle and the Sunrise Rotaract Club encourage all parents, family, friends and the public to come out and support the students. There will be a prize for the school with the best group of supporters. Food and drinks will be available for the students during the breaks.
The top 10 finalists of the preliminary segment will head into the semi-finals on Sunday October 20th. The top five finalist of the semi-finals will head to the final round on Sunday October 27th.
As in previous years, participating schools will benefit from the proceeds of ‘The Spelling Bee’ by being able to submit a ‘Wish List’ for any items they may need at their prospective school. In previous years wish list items have included projectors, screens, computers etc. All participants will receive goody bags while winning pupils and schools receive additional prizes.
For the first time tutorial sessions were held for the participating students in 2016 and it was found to be well received. It has been decided to continue the tutorials for the second year so that participating students will again have the benefit of four tutorial sessions being held at the University of St. Maarten on Saturday September 8th, 15th, 22nd and 29th. The students will be assisted by Rotarians and Rotoractors to learn the words which will give them a better chance to advance to the semi-finals and
finals round of the spelling Bee.
Last years’ finalists were asked for their comments on the Spelling Bee and their comments ranged from ‘It was good’, ‘It was fun’, ‘It was a lot of words’, ‘They learnt many words’ and ‘There was a lot of studying that had to be done’
Mid Isle would like to take this opportunity to thank the main sponsor of ‘The Scotiabank Rotary-Rotaract Spelling Bee Competition, Scotiabank.