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The champion young spellers successful the English connection are acceptable to vie astatine the Scripps National Spelling Bee, which celebrates its 100th day this year.
The archetypal bee was held successful 1925, erstwhile the Louisville Courier-Journal invited different newspapers to big spelling bees and nonstop their champions to Washington. The bee is present held conscionable extracurricular the nation's capital, astatine a normal halfway connected the banks of the Potomac River successful Oxon Hill, Maryland. It starts Tuesday and concludes Thursday night.
This volition beryllium the 97th bee; it was canceled from 1943 to 1945 due to the fact that of World War II and again successful 2020 due to the fact that of the COVID-19 pandemic. This year's champion volition beryllium the 110th, due to the fact that the bee ended successful a two-way necktie respective times and an eight-way necktie successful 2019.
The bee is broadcast and streamed connected channels and platforms owned by Scripps, a Cincinnati-based media company.
— Tuesday, May 27: Preliminary rounds streamed connected Bounce XL, Grit Xtra, Laff More and spellingbee.com from 8 a.m. to 4:40 p.m. EDT.
— Wednesday, May 28: Quarterfinals streamed connected Bounce XL, Grit Xtra, Laff More and spellingbee.com from 8 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. Semifinals streamed connected Bounce XL, Grit Xtra, Laff More and spellingbee.com from 2:30 to 6:30 p.m. Semifinals broadcast connected ION connected tape-delay from 8-10 p.m.
— Thursday, May 29: Finals broadcast connected ION from 8-10 p.m.
The bee features 243 spellers, with astatine slightest 1 from each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia; arsenic good arsenic spellers from U.S. territories Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Northern Mariana Islands; and from Canada, the Bahamas, Germany, Ghana, Kuwait and Nigeria.
Faizan Zaki, past year's runner-up, is backmost aft losing to Bruhat Soma successful a lightning-round tiebreaker known arsenic a “spell-off.” He's a 13-year-old seventh-grader from Allen, Texas. If helium falls abbreviated again, helium would person 1 much twelvemonth of eligibility. He has won respective online bees that apical spellers vie successful arsenic preparation, including the Words of Wisdom Spelling Bee and the South Asian Spelling Bee.
Other imaginable contenders:
— Aishwarya Kallakuri, a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Concord, North Carolina, and victor of the SpellPundit National Spelling Bee.
— Avinav Prem Anand, a 14-year-old eighth-grader from Columbus, Ohio, who finished 2nd to Faizan successful the Words of Wisdom bee.
— Vedanth Raju, a 12-year-old seventh-grader from Aurora, Colorado, and the younger member of 2022 runner-up Vikram Raju.
Spellers suffice by advancing done determination bees hosted by sponsors astir the country. In bid to compete, spellers indispensable not person precocious beyond the eighth people oregon beryllium older than 15.
Spellers indispensable get done 2 preliminary rounds, quizzing them connected words from a database provided successful advance: 1 spelling circular and 1 multiple-choice vocabulary round.
Those who marque it done the preliminaries beryllium for a written spelling and vocabulary test, with the apical 100 oregon truthful finishers advancing to the quarterfinals. The words for the test, and for each consequent rounds, are taken from the Merriam-Webster Unabridged dictionary.
Throughout the quarterfinals and semifinals, spellers are eliminated astatine the microphone done oral spelling oregon vocabulary questions.
About a twelve spellers beforehand to the finals. When lone 2 spellers remain, Scripps has the enactment to usage a lightning-round tiebreaker known arsenic a “spell-off” to find the champion. However, Scripps has taken distant the requirement that the spell-off statesman astatine a circumstantial time, giving bee judges much discretion to fto the contention play out.
The victor receives a customized trophy and much than $50,000 successful currency and prizes. Here are the prize payouts:
— First place: $52,500 successful cash, notation works from Encyclopedia Britannica and Merriam-Webster, and a $1,000 publication to a schoolhouse of the champion's choice.
— Second place: $25,000.
— Third place: $15,000.
— Fourth place: $10,000.
— Fifth place: $5,000.
— Sixth place: $2,500.
— All different finalists: $2,000.
— National Spelling Bee winners bespeak connected however it changed their lives
— Scripps National Spelling Bee tweaks its rules to marque ‘spell-off’ tiebreaker little likely
— Exclusive secrets of the National Spelling Bee: Picking the words to place a champion
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Ben Nuckols has covered the Scripps National Spelling Bee since 2012. Follow his enactment here.
English (US) ·