NY and NJ spellers advance to the semifinals of the 100th Scripps National Spelling Bee

Four students from New York and New Jersey area are advancing to the semifinals Wednesday afternoon at the 100th edition of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, just outside Washington, D.C.

More than 240 spellers from around the country began the week, and 57 will go on to the semifinals, followed by the championship finals on Thursday. The winner will take home more than $52,000 plus a reference library and a three-year membership to Britannica Online.

The youngest of the locals, 10-year-old Jay Nayak from Hunter Elementary in Manhattan, nailed “dysgonic” in the sixth round of competition Tuesday, after asking whether the root was “dis-” meaning against or apart, or “dys-” meaning bad or abnormal. Spellers are allowed to ask various questions until the final 15 seconds of their 90-second turns.

Relief flooded the fifth grader’s face after he got it right: dysgonic, meaning “growing with difficulty in an artificial medium.” The second-time competitor got the unusual words “gliriform” and “veinlet” correct in earlier rounds.

Also advancing are Ishaan Gupta, 11, from Jersey City, New Jersey; Harini Murali,13, from Edison, New Jersey; and Brian Liu, 14, from Great Neck in Nassau County.

Commenters during the live broadcast noted that the New York City students moved fast, racing through their spellings without pausing for extended repetition of definitions or sample sentences.

It’s Liu’s second time at the Bee, and he came prepared, acing “cirri” – plural form of cirrus, as in the king of cloud – “doughty” and “proteome,” or a complete set of proteins.

“I’ve been studying more seriously this year,” Liu said. “Two years ago, I covered mostly roots and language patterns, and this year I’m doing more drilling, like individual words.”

Liu got lucky in one of the vocabulary rounds, where each speller is asked to define a given word, he said. His word was “conclave,” which has been everywhere in recent months.

Liu, who described his stress level as a four out of 10, said his classmates and teachers have been sending him supportive messages throughout the competition — including one message from his Latin teacher to say he doesn’t have to turn in homework this week.

Isabella “Izzy” Canada, 14, a first-time competitor from the Dalton School on the Upper East Side, sailed through “calenture” and “cloddish” in the early rounds, but was ultimately tripped up by “lumichrome,” a fluorescent blue crystalline compound. Her study of Latin and Greek roots came in helpful during the vocab rounds, as with her word “fiduciary.”

“The Greek root ‘fid-’ means ‘to trust’ and the definition had ‘trusting’ in it, so that’s how I figured it out,” Canada said.

Canada said the week-long experience was more fun than stressful, with icebreakers, games, picnics, and more.

Spelling Bee Executive Director Corrie Loeffler said television audiences only see the competition, but the full week includes daily social activities. “When we plan, we don’t plan for the champion, we plan for all 243 kids who qualified,” Loeffler said.

Her favorite word happened to come up in competition on Tuesday: croquembouche, a tower of French pastry wrapped in spun sugar.

You can stream the competition live here.