Mark De Los Santos, an eighth grader who won the Fort Worth area regional spelling bee in 2010 and came in second place last year, won the event again on Wednesday, and advances to compete at the national level.
De Los Santos, 13, from Arlington's Holy Rosary Catholic School, bested 24 other students at the TCU College of Education Regional Spelling Bee, sponsored by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
He powered through 15 rounds of competition and eventually won the championship after spelling "retrocedence" and "desertification."
Runner-up Benjamin Benjadol, 11, of Wilshire Elementary School in Euless, misspelled "litany" before De Los Santos spelled the winning words.
De Los Santos wins an expenses-paid trip to the Scripps National Spelling Bee on May 27 through June 1 in Washington, D.C., plus a trophy, dictionary, subscription to Encyclopedia Brittanica Online, $200 cash, a $100 award and $20 Amazon gift card.
De Los Santos can also audit a TCU course for free. Since he hopes to one day be a neurosurgeon, he said he wants to take a science class.
Way to go, Mark! Tear'em up at Nationals! There's no doubt that you have done hours and hours of hard work at your training. Congrats to a great student! Fort Worth is very proud of you.
Posted by: USMCGunner | March 07, 2012 at 03:03 PM
Dear De Los Santos,
Congratulations for the competition won and best regards from the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification Library in Bonn Germany. We were really impressed reading in the news that "desertification" was the championship word. We would be glad to send you some promotional, information and educational materials related to land degradation and desertification which will enrich your knowledge on environmental problems and will give you additional information on the process of desertification.We wish you all the best in your studies and many new awards.Please give us contact or address where we can send a small package with publications, hope you will be glad to use them or distribute them in your school.
With best regards
Katya Arapnakova
Awareness Raising, Communication and Education Unit- UNCCD LIBRARY
United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD)
Hermann-Ehlers-Str.10, 53113 Bonn, Germany
Tel:+ 49 228 815 2864 Fax:+ 49 228 815 2898
web site: http://www.unccd.int/
Posted by: Katya Arapnakova | March 08, 2012 at 05:51 AM