On 10 August, Alexandra Deady and Layla James went to Auckland Grammar to compete in the semifinal of the NZ Spelling Bee. The semifinal rounds comprised of the top 250 spellers in the country and took place all over New Zealand. At the semifinal, there were two rounds: the written round and the speaking round. Alexandra made it through to the speaking round where she had to stand up and spell words like ‘infallible’. After making it down to the top 20 in the Auckland round, Alexandra was knocked out by the word ‘auxiliary’. Alexandra and Layla represented Carmel College valiantly in the face of words such as ‘moccasin’, ‘maleficence’ and ‘ecstasy’ and greatly impressed their supporters.