Scripps Spelling Bee welcomes 247 spellers

The E.W. Scripps Company said on May 14 that 247 students have qualified for the 2026 Scripps National Spelling Bee, which will return to Washington, D.C., for the first time in 15 years. The competition is scheduled for May 26-28 at DAR Constitution Hall, a new venue for the Bee’s onstage rounds. Organizers said the field includes students from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and several U.S. territories, along with competitors from five countries outside the United States. The Bee’s website says all rounds will also be broadcast on ION platforms and spellingbee.com. ### Why is Washington back on the Bee’s map this year? Washington, D.C., is hosting the national competition again after a 15-year gap, Scripps said in its release. Corrie Loeffler, executive director of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, said the event had long been “part of the fabric of downtown Washington, D.C.” and called the return a point of pride for organizers. (scripps.com) DAR Constitution Hall will host the preliminaries, quarterfinals, semifinals and finals, according to Scripps and the Bee’s official Bee Week page. The Bee Week site says this is the first time since 1957 that Bee Week will be split between two venues, with the JW Marriott Washington, D.C. serving as the host hotel for registration and other offstage events. (scripps.com) ### Who is in this year’s field of 247? The 2026 field includes 169 first-time national competitors, six returning top finishers and 72 other veterans of past national bees, Scripps said. The spellers range in age from 9 to 15, and 24 of them have relatives who previously competed in a combined 45 Scripps National Spelling Bees. (scripps.com) The Bee’s competition page says national qualifiers advanced through local and regional bees and will represent all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Department of Defense Schools in Europe. The same page says spellers will also represent the Bahamas, Canada, Ghana, Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates. ### Which returning spellers stand out? (scripps.com) Three of the nine finalists from 2025 are back in the field, Scripps said: Sarv Dharavane of Dunwoody, Georgia, who placed third last year; Esha Marupudi of Chandler, Arizona, who tied for seventh; and Oliver Halkett of Los Angeles, who also tied for seventh. Scripps also listed two 2024 finalists returning this year — YY Liang of Hartsdale, New York, and Shrey Parikh of Rancho Cucamonga, California — along with 2023 finalist Sarah Fernandes of Omaha, Nebraska. (spellingbee.com) Three competitors are making their fourth straight appearance at the national bee, according to the release: Siyona Kandala of San Antonio, Sariah Titus of Abilene, Texas, and Adarsh Venkannagari of Acton, Massachusetts. Those returning names give the field a mix of repeat contenders and newcomers. (scripps.com) ### How is the competition structured this year? The Bee’s official competition page says the national event will unfold in four segments: preliminaries, quarterfinals, semifinals and finals. The second round of each segment will be a vocabulary round, a format the Bee says was introduced in 2021 to test broader word knowledge. The same rules summary says officials can still use a spell-off to decide the championship if needed. (scripps.com) Under that format, remaining spellers get 90 seconds to spell as many words as they can from a predetermined list, with the highest total winning. ### Which local competitors are already drawing attention? WTSP identified Park Allen, a 14-year-old eighth grader at East Lake Middle School in Pinellas County, Florida, as one of 12 Florida students in this year’s national field. (spellingbee.com) The station said Allen won the Tampa Bay regional bee and is sponsored at the national competition by the University of South Florida. Pinellas County Schools said Allen won the 2026 Scripps Regional Spelling Bee on Feb. 14 at an event hosted by the University of South Florida College of Education. WTSP noted that Tampa Bay students won the national title in 2023 and 2024, citing Largo’s Dev Shah and Tampa’s Bruhat Soma. (wtsp.com) May 26 is the next key date in the competition calendar. The Bee Week page says speller registration starts May 22 at the JW Marriott, and WTSP listed the televised schedule as preliminaries on May 26, quarterfinals and semifinals on May 27, and finals on May 28. (spellingbee.com) (newsroom.pcsb.org)