Posted on 06/01/2007 12:51:50 AM PDT by Recovering_Democrat
Evan O’Dorney always eats fish before his spelling bees. The brain food apparently has served him well: He’s the 2007 Scripps National Spelling Bee champion.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Instead, he is HOMESCHOOLED by his mother...I wonder why that didn't get mentioned?!
BTW, I did a google search for the boys' name and the phrase "homeschool"...the ONLY reference I found was by the San Jose Mercury News--which looks like it is the closest thing to a "big" newspaper near Evan's hometown of Danville!
Here is the link and appropriate phrase in that article:
Danville kid snags national spelling bee title with "serrefine"
Quote:
As Evan hoisted his trophy, his mother Jennifer and father Michael beamed from the audience. Jennifer, who is his homeschool teacher and devoted herself to helping him prepare, blinked back tears.
/s
I watched the spelling bee itself, and they mentioned it there. It was a pretty amazing performance by a pretty amazing kid. I think he knew all the words, didn’t have to sound anything out. At the end he said spelling is just massive memorization. I think this kid memorized thousands and thousands of difficult words and had all bases covered going into the match. Totally amazing.
First of all it isn't MSNBC that you were scolding, but an AP report on an MSNBC web page. So, you can't blame MSNBC here. It is an AP story.
Second, the AP has several other versions of the story where they plainly mention the kid was home-schooled.
I saw that the Washington Post doesn't mention the kid is home-schooled, but who is surprised there?
But, just about every other story I saw mentions the kid was home-schooled.
So, your feeling that home schooling is being ignored or slighted in this case doesn't seem warranted.
When the show ran on ESPN, it indicated that he was homeschooled. Still, I wonder what the breakdown is on private, public, charter and homeschooled contestants.
Venture, which serves nearly 600 students annually, is a kindergarten through 12th grade and adult alternative public school dedicated to Independent Study and Home Schooling. When it was established in 1978 it was a radical idea, but as increasing numbers of students (and parents) discovered the enriching and challenging Venture educational option, the award-winning program gained wide acceptance.
Did you see Evan's parents? His father operates a BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) train and his mother stays at home and is his teacher. They aren't -- as far as I know -- degreed medical, engineering, or legal professionals, they appear to be a regular middle class couple who produced a bespectacled genius right out of Revenge of the Nerds. Good for them!
BTW -- check out the video link on the MSNBC page for the story of the mustachioed Indian immigrant contestant whose parents were deported. There's so much crying in that story that I had to wipe off my monitor. You know the MSM (and Karl Rove) was hoping that kid would win so he could be a PR boost for the amnesty bill.
Did it have relevance to the story? No! Do they mention if a kid who won a football game was homeschooled or private school or public school...no. He is a kid who happens to memorize a list of words and spells them. Congratulations to him, but let’s not go crazy here. They could have picked a better picture of him too. He looks like a geek in that picture.
I watched it, too - and they did say at the end that he was home-schooled, but all the way through the bee, they always said his sponsor’s name, which was the Contra Costa Times newspaper.
The other kids were announced with their schools’ names.
He was funny in his after-bee interview, very taciturn. Didn’t really want to say much. He evidently had said earlier that he didn’t like the Bee very much - and the interviewer asked if winning had changed his mind.
LOL, he wouldn’t say! Said he preferred math and music - that spelling is just memorization - and I noted his disdain at that word.
Yeah, he did say he knew the word serrefine the minute the pronouncer said it.
What homeschool has a football team?
http://www.venture.srvusd.k12.ca.us/about-venture/howven.asp
I attended public school.
Just an example. Maybe they should start one. Maybe Evan could be quarterback.
Of course there is no mention of home schooling. ‘Don’t want to make the public school kids feel inferior or less educated, do you?
I bet the kid didn’t even know who Stuart Scott was, let alone why the dork was asking him if his “likeability” of the Bee had gone up.
His response was great: Do you mean I should like the Bee more now?
If my child was going to the Bee he would be sponsored by Wellington Day School.
Google earth would identify it as the upper corner bedroom of our house.
While these parents sacrificed and gave their time and effort to educate their boy, they had to pay property taxes that went to the local school that could not.
It’s no accident that homeschooled children usually do better.
Actually, here in backwater Montanny homeschoolers DO pool their resources and sponsor various athletic teams...!!!
Imagine THAT....people depending on themselves with no government intervention.....RADICAL.
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Oh, and my Mom went to D.C. SEVEN times with her various charges.....she’s sleeping right now so I can’t ask her how many NATIONAL winners she coached, but I think it was three.
THEY were all “home schooled” in that she is a high school graduate [or WAS at the time, she later put herself through college] and she was acting as a VOLUNTEER for Parochial School students just because she wanted to.
I participated in the Scripps Bee every year I was eligible, 5th thru 8th grade, back in the Dark Ages, when we didn’t have as many words, lol.
Never made it to Washington, but came in 2nd in my state my last year, after representing my county every year. The guy who beat me won the National Bee.
This is a repeat, because I posted about it this time last year, so I won’t tell my exit word. Oh, and I wasn’t home-schooled, but I was country-schooled at the time.
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