After 23 rounds of competition, a new Riverside County Spelling Bee champ was crowned last month.
Corona Norco Unified School District sixth grader Victoria Li, who made her first countywide spelling bee appearance at last month’s competition, beat out 27 other Riverside County students, correctly spelling the word tersanctus to secure her win.
“It was off-list,” Victoria said of the word in an interview with The Riverside Record. “But it means calling God the thrice holy deity, so I think I may have seen it in the Bible before.”
Victoria said she mainly used the official app, Word Club, to study, though she noted that she is also an avid reader and has traveled to a lot of different countries so she has a familiarity with a number of languages. Beyond her dedication to learning new words, Victoria, who wants to be a pediatric surgeon, said she’s never really had a problem remembering things.
“Personally, I think my memory’s always been pretty good,” she said. “I named my 200 stuffed animals, and I remember all of them.”
And while she said she was nervous when she first arrived at the Riverside County Office of Education Conference Center for the competition, Victoria said she was able to quiet her nerves with prayer.
“After I prayed, I could calm down and think about the word,” Victoria said.
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But one thing she wasn’t nervous about was returning to Philistine Rondo School of Discovery to show off her trophy and celebrate her win with all of her friends.
“They kind of just swarmed me,” Victoria said. “I almost collapsed under their weight.”
Assistant Principal Eileen Wunderlich said Victoria got back to the campus carrying her trophy about 10 minutes before school let out. After Victoria was able to tell her class, the announcement was made over the intercom to let the rest of the school know.
“She’s like a celebrity at school right now,” Wunderlich said. “It’s such a big deal, and we’re so proud of her.”
Profess Adhikari, an eighth grader from Springs Charter Schools finished second. Alexa Magaña Aguilera from Coachella Valley Unified School District, Lucas Trinh from Lake Elsinore Unified School District, Jason Xie from Murrieta Valley Unified School District and Kiyara Gunawardena from Temecula Valley Unified School District all tied for third.
Next up, Victoria will represent Riverside County at the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Maryland this May. In an effort to prepare, Victoria said she would be reading a lot more and spending six to eight hours per day studying.
“I want to succeed in the National Bee,” she said.
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