Here are the words from the preliminaries round of Scripps. The words and vocabulary were more difficult than past years so the cutoff score may be lower than past years. However, given the number of students, it is highly likely that the cutoff will lead to a lot of tiebreaking so there may be less spellers in the morning finals. I’m personally predicting a cutoff of around 28.

Round 1 Spelling

  1. barrenness
  2. pestilential
  3. remittent
  4. pataphysics
  5. troglodyte
  6. flagellate
  7. orpiment
  8. theremin
  9. epipodiale
  10. pteridophyte
  11. bocconcini
  12. eumolpique

Round 1 Vocab

  1. insuperable- not able to surpass
  2. chockablock- crowded, filled
  3. explicit- clear explicit expression
  4. timocracy- wealth, honor, glory are the way to rule
  5. dittography- repeated letters in a word
  6. mano a mano- it literally mean hand- to hand
  7. anfractuous- going around in circles
  8. festucine- straw yellow (color)
  9. lalopathy- speech disorder
  10. apercu- brief reference
  11. ironical- peaceful
  12. reticulate- resembling a net (reticularii were gladiators that fought with nets)

Round 2 Vocab

  1. comptroller- financial officer

Round 3 Vocab

  1. timorous- nervousness. fear