Texas Tech University

College of Education Hosts Lubbock Spanish Spelling Bee Championship

Robert Stein

October 31, 2019

College of Education

Lubbock students in third through eighth grades will compete in the championship.

Texas Tech University's Alpha Phi chapter of Sigma Delta Pi, the National Collegiate Hispanic Honor Society, is hosting its ninth annual Lubbock Spanish Spelling Bee Championship. The event will take place from 9 a.m. to noon on Saturday (Nov. 2) in the auditorium of the Texas Tech International Cultural Center, located at 601 Indiana Ave.

The contest will include 48 students in grades three through eight from Lubbock Independent School District (ISD), Lubbock-Cooper ISD and Frenship ISD. The winner and runner-up will represent Lubbock at the 2020 National Spanish Spelling Bee competition July 9-12 in Denver.

Texas Tech and the College of Education are among the sponsors of the event. Comfort Pratt, an associate professor in the College of Education and the Alpha Phi chapter adviser, is the event organizer. Pratt also coordinates Texas Tech's new curriculum and instruction master's degree concentration in bilingual education and English as a Second Language (ESL).

Pratt established the Lubbock Spanish Spelling Bee competition in 2011 to provide an opportunity for students to improve their proficiency in Spanish. The 2018 champion was Fernando Ramirez of Atkins Middle School in Lubbock ISD.