On a sunny Wednesday afternoon, the school yard was a hive of activity as children swarmed around waving banners and cheering for our King Bee Benas. The following morning Benas and his colony of classmates set off early and made a beeline for the Helix, at DCU in Dublin. It was the day of the All Ireland Spelling Bee and the theatre was filled with a buzz of anticipation. Benas, representing Connacht & Ulster, Ollie from Tipperary and Annie from Wexford faced their supporters and banners telling them to ‘Bee-lieve’ in themselves and to ‘Bee the best!’

Each round saw spellers step up to the microphone, their minds abuzz with potential spellings. They progressed through the rounds impressing all present with their precision , grace and nerves of steel. The room hummed with excitement as Benas reached the head to head against Annie. Words such as coalition, hyperthermia, dodecastyle, sanctimonious and vituperate dripped from their mouths like honey, before the final stinging word:chromatophore. Annie was crowned Queen Bee on this occasion. Scoil Mhuire are incredibly proud of our King Bee Benas, who is already planning a return to the competition next year. Benas won €3000 worth of books for the school library, a voucher for himself and on the day all his classmates each received a goodie bag from Easons full of books and stationary. Huge Thank you to Eason’s for this. It was a memorable and un-bee-lievable day. Well Done Benas!!