One Lowcountry middle schooler is spelling his way to the top. He’s one of 30 students competing in the Dorchester County spelling bee on Thursday.
John David better known by his friends as Drew is a 7th grader at Charles B. Dubose Middle School.
“Ever since I was little I always wanted to become a scientist of some type and in math I have always had a knack for that kind of thing,” said David.
This future scientist has a knack for letters too as he defends his title as Dorchester County's spelling bee champion.
“I was pleasantly surprised. I know that Megan and the other seven competitors that placed third through ninth (last year) studied as hard as I did,” said David.
Ted Brinkley, the Principle at DuBose Middle School said, "We had three of the top nine from the district from DuBose so it was a good for us year last year."
"I would just associate them with other random words, and it would help me spell them. Like celerity, I just remember it with celery because you spell it c-e-l-e-r-i-t-y," said Drew on his strategy to remember how to spell words during the spelling bee.
But what doesn’t help is not knowing if he will win. “I wanna win but I don't know if I'll win. 75 work, 25 luck,” said Drew.
Drew says the words start easy and get harder as you go down the list in order. So competitors can get an easy or hard word depending on how they fall.
“I've been practicing for so long, it's a lot of work, but I guess it pays off in the end,” said David.
Drew started studying in October.
The students have hundreds of words to study from. They practice in class and the spelling bee finalists even have a tutor at the school.
The spelling bee is Thursday at 10 a.m. at Summerville High School.