St. Margaret’s 8th-Grader Places 5th in Spelling Bee

Eighth-grader Shivani Kadakia was two letters away from probably becoming the best young speller in the country Thursday, but it was the word “chautauqua” that stumped the Capistrano Beach girl.

Kadakia, a student at St. Margaret’s Episcopal School in San Juan Capistrano, tied for fifth place at the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C. The two-day competition started off with 245 contestants, and Kadakia was among the final six toward the end of Thursday.

As Kadakia’s friends and teachers watched the competition on cable television Thursday, they roared when she correctly spelled a word. The competition lasted for 23 rounds, and it was in the 10th round that Kadakia mistakenly left out two of the U’s in the word “chautauqua” and was disqualified.

“We were so sad for her when that happened,” eighth-grade English teacher Cathy Kent said of the St. Margaret’s spectators who watched the spelling bee at school. “She was so close and was disqualified on a word that wasn’t as difficult as some of later ones. It looked as though she knew how to spell [chautauqua]. But it just came out wrong.”

Because Kadakia and Chicago student Hirsh Sandesara, 12, both placed fifth, they each will receive $625, a $50 bond and a watch from the Scripps Howard Foundation. Champion speller Rebecca Sealfon, 13, of New York was awarded $6,000, a set of encyclopedias and other reference books, a laptop computer and a plaque for her school.

“She spent many nights studying into the late hours for this. She even sacrificed the eighth-grade trip to Washington, D.C., [earlier this year] to prepare for the spelling bee,” Kent said. “It’s wonderful how far she went and she truly did this on her own.”