11-Year-Old From Great Neck To Represent LI In Scripps Spelling Bee

GREAT NECK, NY — An 11-year-old from Great Neck was crowned champion of the ScholarSkills Long Island Spelling Bee Friday night, earning him the chance to represent Long Island in the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Washington, D.C., Newsday reported.

The winning word? Bolognese.

"I kind of related it to bologna, so I knew it had a 'g' in it," Brian Liu, who likes to play violin and read Harry Potter books in his free time, told Newsday.

Friday's spelling bee took place at Half Hollow Hills High School East in Dix Hills. Brian told Newsday that he had spent the two weeks leading up to the event studying two to three hours a night going over a book provided to contestants with 4,000 words that might come up.

Brian's mother, Shuting Peng, gave her son a big hug after his win. The family mostly speaks Chinese at home, and Peng told Newsday she "didn't know [Brian] was such a good speller."

The second-place finisher was Aadita Prajapati, a seventh-grader at Willets Road School in Roslyn Heights. Coming in third was Zara Anand, a fifth-grader at Jeffrey Ratner-Robert Seaman Elementary School in Jericho.

The Scripps National Spelling Bee will take place in Washington, D.C. May 30 to June 1.

Read the full report in Newsday.