Athlone student is Westmeath Spelling Bee champion

An Athlone school student has been announced as year’s winner of the County Westmeath Eason Spelling Bee Final.

Following a tense competition in which she faced several fellow spelling aficionados, Yusra Shaik, a sixth class student of St Mary’s Primary School, Athlone, triumphed in the Westmeath final.

Yusra will now represent Westmeath in the Provincial Spelling Bee in May. Yusra is an avid reader, and ‘A Series Of Unfortunate Events’ is her favourite book series.

Celebrating its eleventh year, the Eason Spelling Bee is part of an overall literacy and reading drive to encourage and inspire children to develop their spelling and pronunciation skills.

The All-Ireland winning bee will get a selection of books for their school library valued at €7,500, in addition to the coveted title of Eason Spelling Bee 2024 Champion.

The winner themselves will also receive a goodie bag packed of books worth €500.

This year, over 525 schools nationwide are competing against each other in a bid to win the prestigious prize. The Eason Spelling Bee team will be travelling around the country to host County Final Bees, and then progressing to a Provincial Bee contest.

The champions from these will then go head-to-head in the All-Ireland Final Bee, taking place in June 2024, with the lucky winner being crowned King or QueenBee.