By JOYANNA LOVE/ Senior Staff Writer

It was a tense few rounds as the final two students in the Chilton County Schools Spelling Bee went back forth, hoping their next word would make them the winner.

The bee looked like it was over twice, but the student who was given the championship word misspelled it both times, meaning both students were back in the competition.

Clanton Middle School student Sydney Beltran eventually correctly spelled her championship word, ventilate, for the win.

In preparation for the competition, Sydney said she studied the definitions, pronunciations and origins of the words on the list of words that could possibly be used in the bee.

“I was kind of nervous,” Sydney said.

She had also determined she “would not mind if I lost.”

After spelling the final word, Sydney said she “was shocked” to have won.

“I didn’t expect myself to win,” Sydney said, commenting she had not had much time to study.

Clanton Intermediate School student Angeleah Tilley placed second.

Prior to the spelling bee, Chilton County Schools Superintendent Jason Griffin congratulated all of the participants for making it this far and thanked everyone involved in holding the spelling bee.

Coordinator Nicole Hoffman reminded students of the rules. Students were asked to repeat the word, spell it and then say the word again. Participants could ask for the definition, for the word to be repeated or be used in a sentence before starting to spell the word. Once a student said a wrong letter, they could not change it.

The first word of the spelling bee was denim.

Some words that gave the students some trouble included poi, Slav, holster, boodle, magazine, sultan, hyphen, hundredth and mesa.

A panel of three judges were used to confirm whether a word was spelled correctly.

Sydney will now have the opportunity to represent Chilton County at the state-level competition in March.