The Palm Beach County Youth Services Department hosted its seventh annual Super Summer Spelling Bee on July 21. The competition was held virtually with 129 campers from 34 Summer Camp Scholarship Program sites participating.
The spelling bee is for students enrolled in the Summer Camp Scholarship Program’s participating camps and provides academic activities to encourage the spirit of learning while preventing the summer slide. Using Kahoot, a virtual learning-based platform, campers’ spelling skills were tested in a fun and interactive way, allowing spellers to compete with campers throughout the county.
“In an effort to combat summer and COVID slides, we have encouraged our camps to integrate education into their curriculum daily,” said Valerie Messineo, a Palm Beach County Youth Services Department senior program specialist. “Campers have practiced their spelling words over the last five weeks, and the Super Summer Spelling Bee is the culmination of their hard work.”
Among the winners were campers from Bethel Evangelical Church, the City of Greenacres, Digital Vibez, the Neil S. Hirsch Family Boys & Girls Club and Preparing Tomorrow’s Leaders summer camps.
Participating agencies include the Palm Beach County Attorney’s Office, the City of West Palm Beach, the Palm Beach County Library System, the Palm Beach County Literacy Coalition, Prime Time Palm Beach County, Friends of Youth Services and Florida Power & Light.
