OCEANSIDE (KGTV) — A 13-year-old from Madison Middle School in the Vista Unified School District has made history as the school's first Spelling Bee champion — and now Roxxy is gearing up to compete against students from across San Diego County.
Roxxy Del Mistro won the district spelling bee, beating out 23 students in grades 6 through 8 to claim the title. Roxxy will compete in the regional Spelling Bee on March 5 at Jackie Robinson Family YMCA, where Roxxy will face students from 42 other San Diego County districts.
Despite the achievement, Roxxy is keeping things low-key with peers.
"Try not to make a big deal about it to my friends. They just know that I won because they announced it over the loudspeaker, the winner. And they congratulated me and we moved on," Roxxy said.
When Roxxy is not studying words, the 13-year-old sounds like a typical seventh grader.
"I just watch cartoons and like, play video games," Roxxy said.
Still, the teen is feeling ready for the regional stage.
"Pretty confident because of the last spelling that I did which was at the school. I was trying my best to not be nervous on stage," Roxxy said.
Roxxy's spelling bee coach, Dustin Brace, says the hard work his students put in speaks for itself.
"It's good to see the kids work so hard," Brace said.
Brace says the experience of coaching has been rewarding, and that the skills students develop in competition carry over into the classroom.
"I think that that shows through in reading and the way that they approach uh their classes here at school if a student gets up there and they're given a word that they're not familiar with and they don't ask for the language of origin and they just spell it the way it sounds," Brace said.
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