Winners of the Spelling Bee accept honors
Winners of the Spelling Bee accept honors(Charity Holman)

TAZEWELL, Va. – Fourth-grade students from Cedar Bluff Elementary and Richlands Elementary fifth-graders took home top honors Thursday evening in the Tom Colley Reading Bee held at Tazewell Middle School.

Teams from around the county competed in the 23rd annual event, named in honor of the late Tom Colley, who was executive editor of the Bluefield Daily Telegraph and was instrumental in creating the Reading Bee.

Students competed in several categories including vocabulary, spelling, comprehension and a performance of an unrehearsed skit.

Graham Intermediate’s team was runner-up in the fourth-grade competition and Tazewell Intermediate was the fifth-grade runner-up.

Members of the fourth-grade Cedar Bluff team were Jordan Hylton, Lanh Pham, Avery Martin and Paisley Richardson. Coach was Dana Smith.

Fifth-grade Richlands winners were Caelyn Arms, Kal Rohrer, Aubree Gilbert and Ella-Rae Patton. Kiffani Dales was the coach.

Members of the Graham team included Neveah Shrader, Laney Holman, Harper Mitchem and Kylie Sparks. Sarah Jones was the coach.

Tazewell’s runner-up team members were Scarlet Brittain, Payton Bowman, Madison Montaigne and Harper Crone. Courtney Mullins was the coach.

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