Black History
#Black Girl M-A-G-I-C: Zaila Avant-garde 1st Black American to win the Spelling Bee
In the July 8 contest held in Orlando, Fla., Zaila won on the word “murraya” a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees. At that moment she spun around and jumped in the air as multi-colored confetti flurried around her.
Zaila Avant-garde, 14
Zaila Avant-garde, 14, from Harvey, La., is the first African American and the first student from Louisiana to win the National Spelling Bee. (Her father changed her surname from Heard to Avant-garde in homage to saxophonist John Coltrane.)
The first person of African descent to win the contest was Jody-Anne Maxwell a 12-year-old from Jamaica in 1998.
The National Spelling Bee began in 1925. Now known as the Scripps National Spelling Bee, the organization acknowledged in a statement that it “has not been immune from the social issues of its times, including the long-fought battle for racial equality. . . Our hope is that Zaila’s amazing accomplishments will be seen as an inspiration to other young people and another step forward in that cause.”
In the July 8 contest held in Orlando, Fla., Zaila won on the word “murraya” a genus of tropical Asiatic and Australian trees. At that moment she spun around and jumped in the air as multi-colored confetti flurried around her.
“It felt really good to win because I have been working on it for like two years. So to actually win the whole thing was like a dream come true,” she told CNN’s “New Day” on Friday. “I felt like in the moment I snapped out of a surreal dream.”
Zaila also holds three Guinness World Records for dribbling, bouncing and juggling basketballs. They include: the most basketballs dribbled simultaneously (six for 30 seconds); the most basketball bounces (307 in 30 seconds); and the most bounce juggles in one minute (255 with four basketballs).
She appeared in a commercial with Golden State Warrior Steph Curry in 2018.
For her win, which was televised on ESPN, she received a trophy and a $50,000 prize. This was only Zaila’s second time competing in a spelling bee. In her first competition she made it to the third round.
She told Good Morning America that the Bee was a “gate-opener to being interested in education.”
Zaila was in the final round with Chaitra Thummala, 12, from San Francisco.
Mayor LaToya Cantrell of New Orleans tweeted: “talk about #blackgirlmagic!”
The New York Times, CNN and BBC News were sources for this report.
