A rare occurrence: Spelling bee champion is member of winning Schools' Challenge Quiz team
Published:Friday | July 3, 2020 | 12:06 AM
Dave Rodney/Gleaner Writer
Chaunté Blackwood, a 17-year-old student at Ardenne High School in St Andrew, has just accomplished a feat that has not happened in recent times - if ever. She is a National Spelling Bee champion who is also a team member of the winning Schools' Challenge Quiz team.
At 13, Chaunté was the all-island winner for The Gleaner Children's Own National Spelling Bee Champion in 2016. And recently, her Schools' Challenge team at Ardenne High School emerged the national winner of the decades-old quiz cup, beating a formidable opponent, St Jago High School, in the June 2020 finals.
Lloyd Foster, an Atlanta-based actuarial scientist, software creator, and a member of the winning Schools' Challenge team in 1973, calculated the probability of Chaunté's rare occurrence, and he determined that there is an astonishing one in 4.5 million chance for this happening, based on the thousands of students who were part of both the Spelling Bee and the quiz journeys across 14 parishes in Jamaica.
Dr Clive Lai, the quiz master for Jamaica's Spelling Bee, himself a former national spelling bee champion, who has been connected to the competition for decades, told The Gleaner that he could not recall this phenomenon ever happening before. Dr Lai was the 1968 Spelling Bee Champion and reached Schools' Challenge Quiz finals for Jamaica College in 1974, but his team was defeated by Kingston College. "Chaunte is a focused, multitalented young lady with a sharp memory, and her future is bright," Dr Lai, who knows the double champion, said.
As for Chaunte, she was never thinking about this accomplishment but says that she was encouraged years ago by one of the current coaches of the quiz team, Danlee Wadsworth, to participate in both competitions. The very articulate fifth -former was somewhat frightened by events unfolding earlier this year with the coronavirus. "It was scary having no real idea whether or not my exams would take place in this academic year, not knowing if or when the Schools’ Challenge Quiz season would resume, not being able to prepare with the team for our quarterfinal match," she shared with The Gleaner. Still, she is happy that her team prevailed despite the challenges, and she thanks her very proud mom, Trecia Blackwood; the coaches; acting Ardenne principal Jackie Pinto; the combined families; and the sponsors.
Chaunté is preparing to sit eightCSEC subjects, and thereafter, she hopes to continue sixth form at Ardenne to pursue studies in law, sociology, communication studies, Caribbean studies, history, and literatures in English.
Looking back on her journey at Ardenne so far, she had this to say. "My Ardenne journey has been a period of self-discovery, of learning who Chaunte Blackwood is in a post-Scripps Howard world, and who she wants to be. Transitioning from a private, preparatory school to a public, secondary school has widened my view of the world and has allowed for me to do some introspection. I’ve made acquaintances from several different walks of life who have impacted me in many positive ways," Chaunté revealed.