Feb. 10, 2022

School Spelling Bee winners advance to regional competition

Five Upper St. Clair students will advance to the 72nd Annual Western Pennsylvania Spelling Bee set for Saturday, March 12, 2022, at Robert Morris University. For the last two years, an Upper St. Clair student has been crowned champion of the regional spelling bee.

To qualify for the regional competition, Yu Rui Lin, Baker Elementary School; Brayden Wong, Eisenhower Elementary School; Drew Holzer, Streams Elementary School; Arjun Kairi, Boyce Middle School; and Nikhil Chandran, Fort Couch Middle School; each finished first in his school’s spelling bee. The school-level spelling bees, open to students in grades 4 – 8, were sponsored by the Upper St. Clair Parent Teacher Council.

Students up through grade 8 from throughout a 26-county region will compete at Robert Morris University. The winner of the Western Pennsylvania Spelling Bee will have the opportunity to compete in the Scripps National Spelling Bee, which will take place in June 2022.  

Upper St. Clair’s school-level results are provided below. 

Baker Elementary School (grade 4)
First Place:  Yu Rui Lin; winning word – abdomen
Second Place:  Praachi Sreeram
Third Place:  Kriti Kulkarni
Fourth Place:  Isabelle Azinon
Fifth Place:  Declan May

Eisenhower Elementary School (grade 4)
First Place:  Brayden Wong; winning word – columns
Second Place:  Luka Beric
Third Place:  Shaivy Shrivastava
Fourth Place:  Eamon Castrodale
Fifth Place:  Sara Alhajhusain

Streams Elementary School (grade 4)
First Place:  Drew Holzer; winning word – emboldened
Second Place:  Ivan Yanov
Third Place:  Bennett Pries
Fourth Place:  Mileidi Miles
Fifth Place:  Preston Poff 

Boyce Middle School
First Place:  Arjun Kairi, grade 5; winning word – obsession
Second Place:  Raana Parchuri, grade 6
Third Place:  Nyasha Rahman, grade 5
Fourth Place:  Kelly Qin, grade 6
Fifth Place:  Rohith Kumar, grade 6

Fort Couch Middle School
First Place:  Nikhil Chandran, grade 8; winning word – vanquishment
Second Place:  Vedant Naik, grade 7
Third Place:  Ayan Amin, grade 8
Fourth Place:  Siddharth Kumar, grade 7
Fifth Place: Emiliano Sobarzo, grade 8

Last year, Upper St. Clair’s Rohan Mehta, then an eighth grader at Fort Couch Middle School, was crowned champion at the 71st Annual Western Pennsylvania Spelling Bee, which was held in March 2021. The runner-up was Boyce Middle School fifth grader Raana Parchuri, who was the 2020 Western Pennsylvania Spelling Bee champion as a fourth grader.