• On Friday evening, the Office of Student Development held its 3rd annual Late Night Spelling Bee in the Weasler Auditorium.
• The event featured giveaways and head-to-head spelling bee activities for students in attendance.
• Ellen Renfroe, a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences, was eventually declared the winner of bee.

A popular forwarded e-mail reads: "Aoccdring to a rscheearch at Cmabridge Uinervtisy, it dowsn't mttaer in what oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae."

However, at the 3rd Annual Late Night Spelling Bee held in the Weasler Auditorium Friday night, this was not the case — the order of the letters were as important as the letters themselves.

In total, there were 22 students who participated in the spelling bee, each representing a different campus residence hall or university apartment.

Carpenter Tower Hall had the most representatives with six, and Straz Tower and O'Donnell Hall had four each.

According to Stephanie Quade, the dean of students in the Office of Student Development and a judge for the bee, each of the 22 spellers excelled in preliminary spell-offs, held in various dorms and apartments before Friday's event.

First, second and third place winners received a trophy and an electronic dictionary, said John Dooley, senior associate dean of Student Development and another judge for the spelling bee.

"Other than that, the last speller standing wins," Dooley said just before the start of the bee.

By the end of round one, nine spellers had already misspelled a word and, consequentially, made their departure.

These students misspelled words such as: alleged, vulgar, privilege, hundredth, pennant and whimper.

In between rounds, audience members got involved in spelling bees of their own. Two people would face-off in front of the crowd, attempting to spell a word.

"I was really surprised and excited about the audience participation the Late Night event had to offer all of the other students who weren't in the event," said Kelly Ryan Fox, a sophomore in the College of Arts & Sciences who attended the event.

"Other than being able to go on stage and spell like I was part of the event, I also got to win a medal and a cool Late Night Spelling Bee t-shirt," Fox said.

Two more student spellers dropped out during the second round, and another departed by the end of round three.

At this point in the bee, the spellers were dropping like flies. Round four proved to be the demise of all but two of the remaining spellers. In that round, eight participants spelled words incorrectly, such as: decedent, alacrity, grievous, eclogue, jongleur and hypocorism.

Round five was the final round — a showdown between two students.

"You're not considered to be the champion until you spell two words correctly in a row," Dooley said, reminding the audience and the two remaining contestants.

The first finalist, Ellen Renfroe, spelled her first word — posterity — with ease.

When her opponent misspelled "intermittent," the door was left open for Renfroe, a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences.

Renfroe then correctly spelled "intermittent" and her final word, buoyant, to win the bee.

Renfroe said the only other time she won a spelling bee was in third grade. At that time, she was awarded with a Crunch candy bar.

"I read a lot, and I always have read a lot, so I think that is probably why I'm a good speller," Renfroe said.

She said she wasn't nervous at all during the competition, and she was glad so many students — over 100 — were in attendance for the event.

"Buoyant, the last word I had to spell, was definitely the most difficult for me," Renfroe said. "But thanks to the Physics 1 class I took last year, I don't think I'll ever forget how to spell it. Especially not after tonight."