More than 150 middle school students from across state gathered at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord on Saturday to compete in the New Hampshire Union Leader Spelling Bee.
After an eliminatory written test round, 31 students made it to the final round, where they spelled for more than two hours and 23 rounds of word competition.
The winner of the competition was eighth-grader Amanda Medina from Lee. The winning word was “caodaism,” the name of a monotheistic religion established in Vietnam. Medina competed head-to-head with the runner-up of the spelling competition, 12-year-old Adithya Puninchittaya of Bedford, for 12 rounds before spelling her last word correctly.
Medina said she gets most of her spelling practice in reading, and playing spelling quiz games online. She will compete in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C., from May 29 to 31.