Schools
Vishnu Nistala Advances To Semifinals Of Scripps National Spelling Bee
The Mentor spelling champion has already outlasted more than 200 of the country's best spellers
Mentor has already outlasted more than 200 of his competitors at the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Vishnu, an eighth grader at , survived a computerized test and two rounds of onstage spelling to earn a slot in today's semifinals.
He had to spell "blitzkrieg" and "stratification" to advance, according to NewsNet5.
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Of the 278 kids who traveled to Washington D.C. for the competition, only 50 spellers remain.
The semifinals will be televised live at 10 a.m. today on ESPN 2 followed by the finals, once again live, at 8 p.m. on ESPN.
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If you don't have cable (or aren't near a TV,) you also can watch the spelling competition online.
To make it to the national compeition in Washington D.C., Vishnu won the - and before beating the best of Geauga and Ashtabula counties in a .
If Vishnu were to win the national bee, he would receive $30,000, a $2,500 savings bond, a $5,000 scholarship from the Sigma Phi Epsilon Educational Foundation and a reference library from Merriam-Webster and Encyclopaedia Britannica.
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