Tri-County Teens Square Off in Bee to Spell C-H-A-M-P-I-O-N

Northville’s Neha Seshadri hopes to better her 2013 12th place finish in the 87th Annual Scripps National Spelling Bee, when the 2014 bee gets under way Wednesday in Maryland.

Neha, a 13-year-old eighth grader at Northville Christian School, is among 281 spellers from eight countries who will compete for more than $33,700 in cash, savings bonds and other prizes.

To get there, she will not only have out outspell 280 other students, but 10 of her neighbors from Michigan. Competition close to home comes from Nathaniel Britton, 13, a seventh grader at Shelby Junior High School in Shelby Township; and Nikhil S. Dwibhashyam, 13, an eighth-grader at Scripps Middle School in Lake Orion.

More than 11,000 students began in the competition, and less than 1 percent made it to the finals.

The only time a Michigan speller has won the bee was in 1941, when Louis Edward Sissman of Detroit correctly spelled “initials.”

About Neha:

Swimming is Neha’s favorite sport, and she recently represented the state of Michigan in the Central Zone Swimming Championship. Singing relaxes her and helps calm her mind, but she also enjoys playing chess, dancing and baking pastries. Neha has an interest in the spiritual, and she learned how to read palms from her grandfather. There are a lot of places she’d like to visit, but because of their natural beauty and scientific importance, the Galápagos Islands are at the top of her list. Her greatest role model is none other than the Scripps National Spelling Bee’s very own Paige Kimble, whom Neha met at the 2013 national finals when she tied for 12th place.

About Nathaniel:

Nathaniel loves soccer, listing it as his main interest, and wishes he had more time to practice. This summer, he’s trying out for the Vardar East Premier soccer team, one of the best teams in Michigan. He also competes in track and chess, and is a first degree black belt in karate. Nathaniel has eclectic taste in music that includes Eminem, Kendrick Lamar, Michael Jackson, Tupac Shakur, Aerosmith, Lorde, Pharrell Williams and Imagine Dragons. The place he would like to visit most is Japan, not only to experience the culture but also to see the contrast between the neon city lights and the natural landscapes. Nathaniel previously competed in the 2012 Scripps National Spelling Bee.

About Nikhil:

Nikhil is a well-rounded student whose interests include both athletic and intellectual pursuits. He studies computer coding and programming and enjoys mathematics and science. When he needs to get out and about, he bicycles, swims, skis and practices karate. After high school, he’d like to go to MIT to study physics and maybe even do some scientific research in Antarctica. In his free time, he can be found re-watching his favorite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation or studying the histories and structures of languages such as Sanskrit, Middle Egyptian, and — because he is a fan of The Lord of the Rings — Quenya Elvish.

Meet all of the spellers here.

The competition is the  nation's largest and longest-running educational promotion, administered on a not-for-profit basis by The E.W. Scripps Company and local spelling bee sponsors in the United States, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Department of Defense Schools in Europe; also, the Bahamas, Canada, China, Ghana, Jamaica, Japan and South Korea.

Follow the competition live:

• Preliminaries: Wednesday, May 28, 8am – 4:45pm EDT. Streaming live on ESPN3.

• Semifinals: Thursday, May 29, 10am – 1pm EDT. Live on ESPN2.

• Championship Finals: Thursday, May 29, 8pm – 10pm EDT. Live on ESPN.

Do you think it’s easy?

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