For the second year, Antilles School’s Manav Thadani won the territorial spelling bee and is moving on in May to represent the U.S. Virgin Islands at the Scripps national event in Washington, D.C.
Thadani, a 13-year-old eighth grader, won in the 43 round at Bertha C. Boschulte Middle School Friday, narrowly beating out Claude O. Markoe Elementary School’s Khaien Donawa, wrapping up his win with the word “commensurate.”
The two went head to head for at least an hour, correctly spelling each word given to them, but in the end, Donawa substituted an “e” for the “i” in ingénue.
“When we were going back and forth together, it was intense,” Donawa said afterward. “When the harder words came up, asking for the origin helped a lot, but I don’t know – when that last word came up, for some reason I thought it was an ‘e,’ so I went for it. It was a great experience, though, and I had fun practicing my coach and learning the list.”
This is the third year Donawa, a sixth grader, participated in the territorial bee – he has two more years left to participate and said Friday that he wants to go all the way next time around.
For Thadani, losing wasn’t an option.
“I didn’t have any doubts,” he said after the bee. “My coach and I put in a lot of work, practicing during school, after school, going over the words and origins, and I knew that it would all pay off. Now, it’s all about D.C. and getting ready and I am excited for that, so we’ll pick back up with the schedule and get what words we can from Scripps to practice.”
