HYDERABAD: The two-day 15th Dawn in Education National Spelling Bee 2019 Hyderabad round kicked off at Mumtaz Mirza auditorium here on Friday with over 250 students of 28 public and private schools from more than 10 districts participating in the competition.

The contest organised by Dawn Media Group in partnership with MCB Bank in education, prizes and judges courtesy Oxford University Press was attended by a large number of students, parents, guardians and teachers.

The contesting teams who hailed from more than 10 districts including Shaheed Benazirabad, Sanghar, Tha­tta, Sujawal, Jamshoro and others except for Hyderabad were divided into pools A (age group 15-17), B (12-14) and C (9-11).

The programme’s pronouncer Momin Zafar articulated words like vicinity, sojo­urn, amnesty, personage, grotesque, marvellous, disarray, intellectual, outrageous, assessments and others to which some contestants answered quickly, more asked for repeating the word, many called for meaning and a few pleaded for sentences to clarify the exact spelling of the words.

The contestants surprised audience with quick answers and received applause throughout the proceedings.

Three teams were decl­ar­ed winners. They belonged to Pool-A of SST Public School Rashidabad, Pool-B of Cadet College Sanghar and Pool-C of Happy Home H.S. School Kotri.

University of Sindh’s controller of examination Mur­taza Siyal, who performed as judge, said that it was a healthy competition.

Four hundred and fifty students of around 50 schools belonging to Hyderabad would participate in the second day of the contest today (Saturday) and winners of the Hyderabad round would take part in regional championship in Karachi.

Published in Dawn, October 12th, 2019