Corona-Norco Student Wins Riverside County Spelling Bee

Ginny Wu, a sixth grader at Washington Elementary School in the Corona-Norco Unified School District, won the 27th Annual Riverside County Spelling Bee March 16 by correctly spelling “vigneron,” a word for someone who grows wine grapes.

Wu said she practiced for this year’s Spelling Bee by having her mother read words to her aloud and spelling them back to her. She won her school
and district Spelling Bees before advancing to the county competition. Wu edged out Virginia Pham, a sixth grader from Warm Springs Middle School in Murrieta, for the title. Pham tripped up on “melitensis,” a medical term relating to a condition caused by bacteria.

Students in grades four to eight sat together in rows at the start of the
competition on the stage at Martin Luther King High School in Riverside.
After three hours of competition, Wu and Pham were left in the 18th round. The Riverside County Spelling Bee is sponsored by the Riverside County
Office of Education and The Press- Enterprise, which helps defray the costs of students competing in state and national competitions.