Published May 29, 2018 at 2:37 PM | Updated at 5:26 PM PDT on May 29, 2018
The National Spelling Bee is here and 16 Bay Area whiz kids are heading to Washington D.C. Tuesday in hopes of becoming the Scripps National Spelling Bee champion.
Anisha Rao from Dublin, Anabel Loucks from Piedmont and Ojas Vatsyayan from Fremont all participated in the national qualifier during "Bee Week" - making it their first time qualifying in the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
There are approximately 516 spellers in this year's Spelling Bee, a significant increase from last year where only 291 competed.