Schools
Chesterfield Student and Future CEO Wins Post-Dispatch Spelling Bee
It's the second year in a row Gokul Venkatachalam has won the regional competition and earned a bid in the national contest, held in May.
For the second year in a row, Chesterfield 12-year-old Gokul Venkatachalam spelled his way to victory at the 27th Annual St. Louis Post-Dispatch Spelling Bee.
At the competition on Saturday, the Parkway West Middle School student defeated 33 other contests through 13 rounds and more than 3 ½ hours of competition. Afterward, he shared with the Post-Dispatch that he had even bigger plans for the future, telling the paper that “I’m going to be the CEO of a company, maybe.”
Venkatachalam’s success has earned him a free trip to Washington to participate in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in May. He made it to the semi-final round at the competition last year and survived to the sixth round a type of New Zealand evergreen tree.
Find out what's happening in Chesterfieldwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here