{"id":220083,"date":"2026-03-14T23:38:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T23:38:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/220083\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T23:38:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T23:38:17","slug":"birmingham-eighth-grader-takes-home-title-in-county-spelling-bee-the-oakland-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/220083\/","title":{"rendered":"Birmingham eighth grader takes home title in county spelling bee \u2013 The Oakland Press"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a set of photos the Oakland Schools Scripps Regional Spelling Bee at the Oakland School Conference Center on Saturday. Over 80 students from 5th to 8th grades from around the county participated in this year\u2019s bee. Claudio Ardanese, an eighth grader at Berkshire Middle School in Birmingham was this year\u2019s winner.<\/p>\n<p>Photos by Matt Fahr\u00a0 Media News Group<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Knox Darling, a 5th grader from Pine Knob Elementary, goes out after mispelling surveillance. \" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0188.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701650\" \/>Knox Darling, a 5th grader from Pine  Knob Elementary, goes out after mispelling surveillance.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Irhan Ali, a 5th grader at Wattles Elementary in Rochester, correctly spells en masse in the second round. \" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0189.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701651\" \/>Irhan Ali, a 5th grader at Wattles Elementary in Rochester, correctly spells en masse in the second round.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Candence Gibson, a 5th grader from Adler Elementary, misses on spelling prowess in the 3rd round.\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0194.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701652\" \/>Candence Gibson, a 5th grader from Adler Elementary, misses on spelling prowess in the 3rd round.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Robin Knoppe, a 5th grader from Andersonville Elementary, advances to the fourth round by correctly spelling hooey.\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0195.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701653\" \/>Robin Knoppe, a 5th grader from Andersonville Elementary, advances to the fourth round by correctly spelling hooey.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Ahmad Saleh, a sixth grader from the Huda School in Franklin, advances by spelling calzone right in the third round.\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0198.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701654\" \/>Ahmad Saleh, a sixth grader from the Huda School in Franklin, advances by spelling calzone right in the third round.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"All the spellers get ready for the first round of words at the bee held at the Oakland Schools Conference Center.\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0185.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701661\" \/>All the spellers get ready for the first round of words at the bee held at the Oakland Schools Conference Center.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Claudio Ardanese with Oakland ISD Superintendent Ken Gutman.\" width=\"4000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0223-rotated.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701663\" \/>Claudio Ardanese with Oakland ISD Superintendent Ken Gutman.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Jonathan Oatley and his family. Oatley finished in second place.\" width=\"4000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0222-rotated.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701664\" \/>Jonathan Oatley and his family. Oatley finished in second place.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"The field was narrowed to 34 students after two rounds of words.\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0191.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701665\" \/>The field was narrowed to 34 students after two rounds of words.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" lazyautosizes lazyload\" alt=\"Winner Claudio Ardanese (8) and runner-up Jonathan Oatley (29) with Oakland ISD Superintendent Ken Gutman\" width=\"6000\" data- src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/DSC_0217.jpg\" data-attachment-id=\"2701671\" \/>Winner Claudio Ardanese (8) and runner-up Jonathan Oatley (29) with Oakland ISD Superintendent Ken Gutman<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Here is a set of photos the Oakland Schools Scripps Regional Spelling Bee at the Oakland School Conference&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":220084,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[15,181,23,795,100,143,904,145,144],"class_list":["post-220083","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-education","tag-latest-headlines","tag-local-news","tag-michigan","tag-news","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-county","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=220083"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/220083\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/220084"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=220083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=220083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=220083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}