North Andover Girl Heads to National Spelling Bee

NORTH ANDOVER — Ashrita Gandhari, a 10-year-old spelling-bee champ, has spelled her way to Maryland next month to compete in the 90th annual Scripps National Spelling Bee, according to the Eagle-Tribune.

Gandhari, a fourth-grader at Franklin Elementary School, earned her place at the podium by winning the regional spelling bee in Lynn earlier in March.

The annual Scripps National Spelling Bee is May 28 to June 3.

To prepare, the young speller goes through a daily word list with her parents, Sirisha Bhumireddy and Bharat Gandhari, and learns the origin of each word, the Eagle-Tribune states.

This helps to figure out how to spell words used in the competition that are not on the lists.

All her hard work has paid off.

She won the 2015 regional bee when she was 8. She also competed last year, when after nearly five hours of spelling, Ashrita came in second.

And this year she out-spelled a Peabody Middle School student for the first-place title, and the chance to go to the national bee.

Her goal is to make it to the final round of the top 50 spellers, according to the Eagle-Tribune.

Can you spell C-H-A-M-P-I-O-N?

For more on this story read the Eagle-Tribune.