28-05-2025
Local teen falls in sixth round of national spelling bee
PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) — A Dunlap Valley Middle School eighth grader was eliminated from the quarterfinals of the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Kavin Kumar Suriya Prakash, 14, had successfully navigated his way through five rounds of the 100th Scripps Spelling Bee before falling in the sixth round.
The word he had to spell? Funis, which is another word for an umbilical cord, according to the Bee. He spelled it 'funice.'
Prakash said his favorite part of the competition was when they went out for the Memorial Picnic.
'My favorite part of the competition so far is when we went out for the memorial picnic, because I was able to go for batting practice,' he said. 'I also got my own baseball card.'
He said Kroger had a setup where they were able to hold a bat, and they took their picture and created them a baseball card.
Before being knocked out in the quarterfinals, Prakash successfully spelled the word 'logothete,' in the first round Tuesday. Logothete was an administrator under the Byzantine emperors, according to the competition's website.
In round two, he then correctly defined the word 'compelling' before getting the required 13 answers correct on a written test in round three to move on to the fourth round.
On Wednesday morning, Prakash went on to correctly spell 'bluestocking' in round four.
He then correctly defined the word 'omnipotent,' meaning 'has virtually unlimited power,' in round five of the competition before falling in round six.
He said there were a bunch of websites out there to help study, but he mostly just used the Merriam-Webster Dictionary to study for the competition.
Prakash also enjoys building and coding robots, as he won the Illinois State Champion's Award in the FIRST Lego League World Festival in 2023, according to his profile on the Spelling Bee's website.
He also enjoys chess, winning a silver medal in the state competition. He competes in Scholastic Bowl and Mathcounts, for which he also advanced to the state championships.
Prakash also runs cross country and earned a black belt in Taekwondo when he was eight.
While this is Prakash's last year in the spelling bee, he said it means a lot to him to represent his community and hometown of Edwards, as he knows they were watching at home.
'It means a lot because I know that they're going to be watching from home, and they've been supporting me throughout the entire time,' he said.
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