Five local students competed in the 2021 Alaska State Spelling Bee late last month. According to information from the Alaska Spelling Bee organization, 88 students in grades three through eight qualified for the state-level competition. The bee's first place winner was Ishita Khiani, a seventh-grader at Dzantik'i Heeni Middle School in Juneau. The Ketchikan School District was represented by Thierry Oyedeji, a Houghtaling Elementary fourth-grader; Sarah Reynolds, a Fawn Mountain Elementary fifth-grader; Bella Wills, a Tongass School of Arts and Sciences fifth-grader; Alijhan Millendez, a Ketchikan Charter School fifth-grader; and Riley Saxton, a Point Higgins Elementary sixth-grader. Those students all won their classroom-level and school-level spelling bees earlier this year, and then competed against each other in the district-wide bee in early March.