Sophomore Devon St. John Wins Spelling Bee

Sophomore Devon St. John won the annual Huntington High School spelling bee following an exciting battle with seniors Ryan Curran and Peter Gaal, who finished as the runners-up.

Ms. St. John is a steely competitor, which isn’t surprising since she’s the daughter of two parents who were NCAA Division I athletes. The teenager’s academic grade average exceeded 103 in the second marking period. She plays on the Blue Devil varsity soccer and lacrosse teams.

“The spelling bee is always so much fun,” Ms. St. John said. “I was in it last year and came in third place so it was cool to come in first! The only reason I knew the final word was because it’s a Latin derivative, so shout-out to Mrs. [Kristin] Fortunato.”

Ms. St. John captured first place after correctly spelling the word “nihilism.” Huntington English teachers John Pagano, Michael Schwendemann and Dianna Cazzolino served as the judges. English teachers Aimee Antorino and Helen Guarino coordinated the event, which included 44 contestants in all.

The spelling bee finals played out over three periods near the end of a recent school day. The competition was closely contested. English Honor Society officers chose the words posed to contestants and created the sentences used in the competition itself. Students were allowed to attend the event during their free periods or lunch periods or if their respective teacher brought them down to the auditorium.

“The spelling bee was great,” Mr. Gaal said. “I really appreciated the opportunity to be able to compete with everyone. Even though it was a competition, everyone was extremely friendly. I enjoyed that. I’ve always enjoyed spelling, so it was a fun event for me. There were a few mishaps throughout the event, but if the English Honor Society decides to keep hosting a spelling bee, and they iron out the issues. I could see this becoming a really big thing. It already was this year with a lot of people were in the auditorium. That was good to see. In my experience, it isn’t common to see Huntington High School students so united, considering everyone has such varying interests.

The officers of Huntington’s Post Ellipsis chapter of the National English Honor Society spent weeks planning this year’s event. A preliminary spelling test was administered in English classes with the top scorers advancing to the finals in the auditorium.

The dictionary defines the word “nihilism” as a noun used to indicate “the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless.” Wikipedia said that “nihilism is a philosophy, or family of views within philosophy, that rejects generally accepted or fundamental aspects of human existence, such as objective truth, knowledge, morality, values or meaning.”