Ten secondary school students are competing in the inaugural Secondary Schools Creole Spelling Bee, a new competition that puts the Kwéyòl language at the centre of a school contest in Dominica. The event gets under way at 10:00 a.m. on Friday, November 13, 2026, at the Alliance Française de la Dominique.
The competitors represent secondary schools from across the island, bringing students from different parts of Dominica together around a shared test of Kwéyòl literacy. Spelling bees are a familiar feature of school life in many countries, and this first edition applies the same format to the French-based Creole that is spoken in homes, villages and communities across the Nature Isle.
The contest focuses on written Kwéyòl, a language that carries deep cultural significance for Dominicans at home and across the diaspora. By asking students to spell words correctly in Kwéyòl, the competition encourages young people to engage with the written form of a language that has long been passed on mainly through speech, song and oral tradition.
The Alliance Française de la Dominique is hosting the event, providing a venue for a competition that highlights the island's linguistic heritage. Its role as host places the contest within a wider effort to celebrate Creole culture and to make it a visible part of education.
The story was first reported by Dominica News Online, which described the competition as the first of its kind for secondary schools on the island. Details about the organisers, the sponsors, the judging arrangements and the prizes were not available in the material used for this report, and further information may be released by the organisers in due course.
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