Menlo Park Student Wins 5th Grade Spelling Bee [PHOTOS]

This past Sunday Ray 'The Prize Guy' hosted the first ever New Jersey 5th Grade Spelling Bee at Middlesex County College in Edison.

With over 120 students in the bee from 13 different counties in New Jersey it was quite the competition, especially with $1,000 dollars on the line!

Students from Bergen, Burlington, Mercer, Monmouth, Ocean, Hunterdon, Somerset, Essex, Hudson, Gloucester, Union, Warren and Morris counties participated in the bee.

With the bee lasting over 5 hours (the first round took 3 hours all by itself!) Here are the top five!

• 5th Place: Michael Krepula- Avenel Street School, Avenel, Middlesex County
• 4th Place: Chris Sherman- Nellie F. Bennett Elementary, Point Pleasant, Ocean County
• 3rd Place: Ethan Herbst- Roosevelt Elementary, River Edge, Bergen County
• 2nd Place- Julia Kopf- George Mitchell Elementary, Little Egg Harbor, Ocean County

Congratulations to our first place winner Selena Wang from Menlo Park Elementary in Edison for coming in first place and winning $1,000! Her father emailed me this morning and told me he's going to open an account so his daughter can use the money wisely (Good thinking Dad!)

Thank you to everyone who participated and to all the teachers and parents for getting their children involved with this bee!