It took a "smidge" of good luck, but Towamensing Elementary School sixth-grade student Kira Hauser took home the trophy Thursday at the school's fourth annual spelling bee.

In a gymnasium full of her peers, Hauser closed out the competition by spelling "frontier" and "smidge" correctly, defeating fifth-grade winner Jared Reinhard and fourth-grade champion Erin Gombert."It was kind of fun, but a lot of stress with all those people looking at you," Hauser said. "You're going against one other person, and if you get it wrong, you can be eliminated."Standardized homeroom spelling bees were held at the end of May. The top two winners from each fourth- through sixth-grade homeroom qualify for the overall spelling bee. The third-place winner is the alternate.At Thursday's bee, each of the first three rounds whittled the competition down to the top spellers in each grade.Tammy Hoffman, speech teacher, was the pronouncer of words, while Stacey Olewine and Kathryn Malay, reading specialists, were the judges."Prizes are paid for by our Towamensing parent-teacher organization," said Kristin Heller, Towamensing librarian, who hosted the event.Prizes included a trophy for first place, medals for second and third place, and gift cards to Barnes and Noble of varying amounts for every participant depending on how they finish.The trophy and medals were purchased from Shea's Hardware in Palmerton.For likely the first time, event officials had to use video replay to determine the letter used by a participant.Late in the final round, Hauser misspelled cushion, but another misspelling opened the door for her again."I was nervous because I didn't know how to spell cushion at first, so I was glad to get a second opportunity," she said. "All of the competitors did a great job, too."Competitors in addition to Hauser, Reinhard and Gombert included Ella Baumgardt, Riley Bonser, Sabrina Costenbader, Zane Himmelwright, Chiara Sell, Emma Fugazzotto, Adriana Fugazzotto, Mason George, Colby Haydt, Jacob Denicola, Nicole Kester, Cadee Munjone, Hannah Barry, Elizabeth Melber, Kelsey Balliet, Gianna Vartholomeos, Marissa Crispo and Jordan Mann.All participants, except Vartholomeos, made their spelling debut.It is the third year in a row Vartholomeos qualified for the bee.