2020’s National Spelling Bee was canceled for the first time since World War II due to concerns around COVID-19. Now the Bee is back on for this summer, in a modified format. And the road to qualifying for the finals leads a new hosting site in Orlando, instead of the longtime locations just outside of Washington, D.C.
All of the various qualifying rounds (preliminaries, quarterfinals and semifinals) for the Bee will happen virtually this year. Then the finals — with only around a dozen competitors from around the country — will take place in Orlando at Disney’s ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex.
Wide World of Sports, incidentally, was the site of both the NBA and MLS bubbles and return to play last year.
The Scripps National Spelling Bee happens on Thursday, July 8, and will be broadcast live on ESPN2.
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This article appears in Feb 17-23, 2021.