The parents of an Indian-American teen have taken legal action after their daughter lost a regional spelling bee competition. 12-year-old Amara Chepuri had lost the Tampa Bay regional spelling bee in February this year after misspelling the world ‘pallbearer’. The Chepuris are now considering legal action as the word had not been on the ‘predetermined’ list. They claim that their daughter was disqualified unfairly and should still be eligible for the national contest.
‘She could have won. She’s one of the best spellers in Florida,” her father told the Tampa Bay Times.
According to details accessed by the Tampa Bay Times, Amara had asked her teacher for clarification about the spelling bee rules and the list of words they had received to study. She had also queried about what would happen if the list of words got exhausted before a winner was chosen. Her teacher had consequently explained via email that the school had also prepared an additional list of 150 words — that were not provided to the competitors — to be used “if we exhaust the list”.
Controversy however arose when the judges appeared to skip some words on the predetermined list after after it became evident that the two finalists had memorised all the words. The other contestant was eventually declared the winner after spelling the word equality correctly. The organisers have insisted that this changing the list was ‘common practice’ for spelling bees and stood by their decision to disqualify Amara.
The Chepuris had subsequently challenged the outcome and later entered their daughter in another qualifying event while they waited for a response from the school. Her parents had argued that Amara had technically not yet been disqualified before the registration deadline. Eligibility rules however dictate that a speller disqualified at any level cannot seek advancement through another school.
The school however noted that it had responded nearly two weeks before the regional. While Amara went on to win her second qualifying attempt, a Scripps Spelling Bee representative had soon arrived at the event to announce her disqualification.