CAROLAN Heaven led Kiddies Preparatory School to victory over nine other schools in the recent Westmoreland Cooperative Credit Union’s (WCCU) Stars Spelling Competition.

The competition was held at the WCCU’s head office.

General manager, Gregory Ashman, expressed pleasure at the entrants’ level of knowledge and made a commitment to continue with educational competitions of this nature to enhance the development of young minds.

Through its education committee, the WCCU has been active in many basic and prep schools across the parish; and it has also adopted some of the educational institutions.

The Stars Spelling Competition, an initiative of the WCCU, was designed to encourage reading and widen the vocabulary of young children.

Kiddies Prep’s Heaven received a bicycle as her prize for being the top speller, her teacher, Nadia Lettman received a weekend for two at Hedonism II and the school got a trophy along with $3,500.

The second and third place awards went, respectively, to Sherese Barnes of Loving Care Early Childhood Institute and Moesha Whittaker of Savanna-la-mar SDA Prepratory. They were given an educational computer game-pack and a set of storybooks while their teachers each received dinners for two at Falcon Cottages and Merril’s Beach Resort in Negril.

WCCU’s marketing officer, Kerry Parchment, noted that the competition was just one way of giving back to the children who all have accounts with the Credit Union.

“We are always taking your money but this time we are giving you back something just to show our appreciation to you, our valued young clients, that we love and care for you,” she said.