Road to victory: Indian Hills 8th grader Ishya Bhavsar prepares for the state spelling bee

When eighth grader Ishya Bhavsar stepped up to the wooden podium at The Hilltop Campus, she was greeted by the pounding stage lights and the three judges staring at her blankly. 

“If you get this word right, you will have won the Johnson County spelling bee,” the judge said. 

“L-E-G-E-R-D-E-M-A-I-N,” Bhavsar spelled out, staring at the floor.

With the correct answer, the crowd started cheering. Bhavsar had just qualified for the State Spelling Bee — beating out 70 other kids in the Johnson County area. 

“I’ve never felt so relieved and happy,” Bhavsar said. “I won and I was really proud of myself.”

Bhavsar got into spelling after watching her first National Spelling Bee at eight years old, which gradually sprouted a goal for herself — she wanted to make it to the National Spelling Bee. 

“[The national spelling bee] is on ESPN Prime Time and I thought that was amazing that you could go on ESPN to spell,” Bhavsar said. “I really like words, so I thought that would be the best way to learn more.”

Bhavsar spends two to three hours every weekday and five to six hours on the weekends studying — making for a total of 19-25 hours of studying a week. Each time she sees a new word, she looks it up and finds its latin roots — the words that it came from — in order to better understand why it’s spelled the way it is. Then, her mom quizzes her over the several lists of commonly asked words that she has to prepare. For the Johnson County spelling bee, she was given a list of 4,000 words to study — which were only asked in the preliminary round. 

According to Bhavsar, finding roots allows her to memorize words better because she understands the origin — whether it’s in Spanish, German or Greek. Knowing roots means that she already knows how to spell part of the word, helping her when she’s put on the spot on the stage.

“It’s impossible to memorize every single word in the dictionary,” Bhavsar said. “So you need to find patterns in words so you can spell more. It’s basically learning 20 words at a time.”

The studying comes with learning at least 2,500 words per week — Bhavsar’s least favorite part. Each time she messes up the new word, she’s less motivated to learn it.

“I get frustrated easily,” Bhavsar said. “It’s my personality because when I mess up I feel like I’ve done something wrong but I have to remind myself that I’m still learning.” 

According to freshman Bryson Langford, who’s known Bhavsar for two years through tennis, Bhavsar is super passionate about spelling. 

“I can see how much time and effort she’s put into it,” Langford said. “I think it’s actually amazing that she’s accomplished so much.” 

With all her hard vocabulary and hours of studying, Bhavsar has now qualified for the State Spelling Bee on March 21. Her goal is to study four to six hours a day leading up to State. 

“I’m cautiously hopeful that I’ll win,” Bhavsar said. “And if I don’t, I want to at least do good there. I know I’ve studied a lot and I’ve learned so many new words.”