spelling bee

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A Year After Losing in 'Spell-Off,' He Came Back to Win

Texas teen recovers from stumble to claim national spelling bee crown

(Newser) - Just one year after a narrow defeat, 13-year-old Faizan Zaki rebounded from a dramatic misstep Thursday night to claim victory at the Scripps National Spelling Bee, earning the title of America's best speller. Zaki of Allen, Texas, who was last year's runner-up, bested a field of nine...

After Backlash, National Spelling Bee Makes a Change

Scripps is doing away with the rapid-fire tiebreaker

(Newser) - Major changes are coming to the Scripps National Spelling Bee this year following backlash over last year's abrupt finale. Scripps has dropped its rule requiring a rapid-fire "spell-off" tiebreaker when the finals push up against the end of their scheduled TV slot. Now, judges can let regular...

'Unbeatable' Kid Wins Scripps National Spelling Bee

Bruhat Soma won the title Thursday night in a spell-off

(Newser) - Bruhat Soma was unbeatable before he arrived at the Scripps National Spelling Bee, and neither the dictionary, nor his competitors, nor a lightning-round tiebreaker challenged him on the way to victory. Bruhat spelled 29 words correctly in the tiebreaker, beating Faizan Zaki by nine, to win the title on Thursday...

National Spelling Bee Champ Wins on a 'Layup'

'Psammophile' was his winning word

(Newser) - Soft-spoken but brimming with confidence, Dev Shah asked precise questions about obscure Greek roots, rushed through his second-to-last word and rolled to the Scripps National Spelling Bee title Thursday night, the AP reports. Dev, a 14-year-old from Largo, Florida, had his spelling career interrupted by the pandemic, then didn't...

Spelling Bee Winner Was Eliminated, Then Reinstated

Harini Logan won first-ever tiebreaker

(Newser) - Harini Logan was eliminated from the Scripps National Spelling Bee once, then reinstated. She subsequently missed four words in a grueling standoff against Vikram Raju, including one that would have given her the title. Then it was on to the first-ever lightning-round tiebreaker; Harini finally claimed the trophy. The 14-year-old...

After Jeopardy! Rejection, LeVar Burton Gets New Gig

'Reading Rainbow,' 'Roots' star will host Scripps National Spelling Bee in June

(Newser) - "Happy Friday, y'all!" was LeVar Burton's cheerful greeting on Twitter this morning, before the announcement likely contributing to his good mood was made. That revelation, per a release cited by NPR : The Emmy- and Grammy-winning actor and former host of PBS' Reading Rainbow has a new...

Basketball Prodigy Wins National Spelling Bee

Zalia Avant-garde is first African American champ

(Newser) - Zaila Avant-garde understood the significance of what she was doing as she stood on the Scripps National Spelling Bee stage, peppering pronouncer Jacques Bailly with questions about Greek and Latin roots. Zaila knew she would be the first African American winner of the bee. She knew Black kids around the...

She's a Spelling Bee Finalist, and a Basketball Prodigy

Meet Zaila Avant-garde of Louisiana

(Newser) - Finalists in the Scripps National Spelling Bee will get a visit from one of the nation's most prominent educators: first lady Jill Biden. The first lady will meet with spellers and their families before the bee Thursday evening and stay to watch the competition, per the AP . This year'...

National Spelling Bee Has Very Unexpected Ending

After words ran out, it was an 8-way tie

(Newser) - Eight spellers were better than the dictionary. They were better than anything the Scripps National Spelling Bee could throw at them. And they all ended up with a hand on the trophy. In the most extraordinary ending in the 94-year history of the competition, the bee ended in an eight-way...

What Sealed the Deal in Spelling Bee: 'Koinonia'

Wild card Karthik Nemmani wins Scripps National Spelling Bee

(Newser) - Karthik Nemmani didn't win his regional spelling bee. He didn't even win his county spelling bee. But he was still good enough to win the Scripps National Spelling Bee. Throwing everything he had into his one shot at glory, 14-year-old Karthik outlasted better-known spellers on Thursday night and...

People in 11 States Can't Spell This One Word

'Beautiful' apparently gets mangled quite a lot; so does 'schedule,' 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'

(Newser) - The Scripps National Spelling Bee is underway this week, and while viewers play along at home, they may want to bone up on certain words based on their location. Per People , Google Trends checked out online searches for each state that included the term "how to spell" to come...

CNN Takes Heat Over Sanskrit Quip
CNN Takes Heat
Over Sanskrit Quip
Jun 5, 2017 8:46 AM CDT

CNN Takes Heat Over Sanskrit Quip

Host Alisyn Camerota's joke to Indian-American spelling bee champ falls flat

(Newser) - CNN is taking heat after a host assumed a teen spelling bee champ of Indian descent was "used to using" Sanskrit. The Washington Post reports the exchange occurred on the network's "New Day" program following 12-year-old Ananya Vinay's victory at Thursday night's 90th annual Scripps...

Girl, 12, Wins National Spelling Bee With 'Marocain'

Ananya Vinay is the first sole winner since 2013

(Newser) - For Ananya Vinay, the road to victory ran through heiligenschein, Tchefuncte, zeaxanthin, and cecidomyia. The 12-year-old from Fresno, Calif., won the 90th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee Thursday night when she correctly spelled "marocain," a French-derived word for a dress fabric, after runner-up Rohan Rajeev stumbled on "...

Girl Is Youngest Ever to Head to National Spelling Bee

5-year-old Edith Fuller of Oklahoma can spell circles around you

(Newser) - Plenty of adults would struggle to spell "colloquial," "odori" and "sevruga." Five-year-old Edith Fuller made it look like a cakewalk. An early crowd favorite, Edith beat out about 50 competitors age 5 to 14 at the Green Country Regional Spelling Bee in Tulsa, Okla., on...

Youngest-Ever Winner Is National Bee Co-Champ

11-year-old won with 'gesellschaft'

(Newser) - The words were tougher. The final rounds lasted longer. The result was the same. The Scripps National Spelling Bee ended in a tie for the third consecutive year Thursday night, with Jairam Hathwar and Nihar Janga declared co-champions after a roller-coaster finish. Jairam, 13, is the younger brother of the...

Scripps Spelling Bee's 6-Year-Old Competitor Says Goodbye

Akash Vukoti, this year's youngest contestant, missed 'bacteriolytic'

(Newser) - "Bacteriolytic" was what did Akash Vukoti in during the Scripps National Spelling Bee Wednesday, but considering he's only 6 years old, the fact that he appeared in the contest at all was no small feat, per NPR . The youngest of this year's 285 super-spellers, Akash used an...

'Scherenschnitte' Spells Tie in National Bee

This is the first time there's been 2 ties in a row

(Newser) - They couldn't be rattled. They couldn't be denied. Gokul Venkatachalam and Vanya Shivashankar had worked too hard and come close too many times not to win the Scripps National Spelling Bee. So they shared the title, making history in two different ways. The bee hadn't ended in...

After the Bee: What Happens to Whiz-Kid Spellers

Former victor likens the Scripps spelling contest to 'Hunger Games'

(Newser) - Tonight we get to see 285 young minds square off in the Scripps National Spelling Bee finals (8pm EDT on ESPN), and meet at least one more member of one of the world's most elite clubs: winners of the bee . Past victors describe to the Guardian the high stakes...

Spelling Bee Runs Out of Words

Contestants evenly matched after 66 rounds

(Newser) - Two spelling bee contestants in Missouri turned out to be so evenly matched that they exhausted the word list plus 20 extra words in a 66-round battle. Some 25 students started Jackson County Spelling Bee's championship round on Saturday, but after just 19 rounds, 11-year old Sophia Hoffman and...

National Spelling Bee Kicks Off With Unusual Twist

Up first: first-ever vocab test

(Newser) - Simply knowing how to spell words won't be enough to win the 86th Scripps National Spelling Bee; for once, competitors will actually have to know what some words mean, too. The event kicked off today, with, for the first time in its history, a vocabulary test . Some 281 spellers...

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