Reader's Digest National Word Power Challenge

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The Reader's Digest National Word Power Challenge was an annual vocabulary competition in the United States for youth in sixth, seventh, or eighth grade. It was sponsored by Reader's Digest magazine.

A vocabulary is a set of familiar words within a person's language. A vocabulary, usually developed with age, serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge. Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the largest challenges in learning a second language.

United States Federal republic in North America

The United States of America (USA), commonly known as the United States or America, is a country comprising 50 states, a federal district, five major self-governing territories, and various possessions. At 3.8 million square miles, the United States is the world's third or fourth largest country by total area and is slightly smaller than the entire continent of Europe's 3.9 million square miles. With a population of over 327 million people, the U.S. is the third most populous country. The capital is Washington, D.C., and the largest city by population is New York City. Forty-eight states and the capital's federal district are contiguous in North America between Canada and Mexico. The State of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east and across the Bering Strait from Russia to the west. The State of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U.S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea, stretching across nine official time zones. The extremely diverse geography, climate, and wildlife of the United States make it one of the world's 17 megadiverse countries.

<i>Readers Digest</i> magazine

Reader's Digest is an American general-interest family magazine, published ten times a year. Formerly based in Chappaqua, New York, it is now headquartered in Midtown Manhattan. The magazine was founded in 1922, by DeWitt Wallace and Lila Bell Wallace. For many years, Reader's Digest was the best-selling consumer magazine in the United States; it lost the distinction in 2009 to Better Homes and Gardens. According to Mediamark Research (2006), Reader's Digest reaches more readers with household incomes of $100,000+ than Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, Business Week, and Inc. combined.

Contents

Competition

Levels

School

Competition began at school level. Typically, teachers gave students 25-question multiple-choice tests. Classroom winners then competed with other classroom winners from the same grade to determine the school-wide grade-level champion. The school champion then took a multiple-choice test which determined the top 100 students in the state.

Multiple choice or objective response is a form of an objective assessment in which respondents are asked to select only correct answers from the choices offered as a list. The multiple choice format is most frequently used in educational testing, in market research, and in elections, when a person chooses between multiple candidates, parties, or policies.

State

The top 100 students were invited to a state competition, where they were given 25 multiple-choice questions to determine the top ten. The top ten then went through a few rounds of questions to determine the state champion. The state champion advanced to national competition.

National

Students from every state, Washington, D.C., and one student from a Department of Defense school got to compete at national level. The students took a 25-question multiple-choice test, with the top ten scorers going on to compete in a nationally televised event. The moderator was a celebrity; Al Roker was a regular.

United States Department of Defense United States federal executive department

The Department of Defense is an executive branch department of the federal government charged with coordinating and supervising all agencies and functions of the government concerned directly with national security and the United States Armed Forces. The department is the largest employer in the world, with nearly 1.3 million active duty servicemen and women as of 2016. Adding to its employees are over 826,000 National Guardsmen and Reservists from the four services, and over 732,000 civilians bringing the total to over 2.8 million employees. Headquartered at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., the DoD's stated mission is to provide "the military forces needed to deter war and ensure our nation's security".

Al Roker American weather presenter, television and radio personality

Albert Lincoln Roker Jr. is an American weather forecaster, journalist, television personality, actor, and author. He is the current weather anchor on NBC's Today. Roker also serves as co-host on #3rdHourToday; although the latter not officially announced by NBC News. He has an inactive American Meteorological Society Television Seal #238.

Prizes

A scholarship is an award of financial aid for a student to further their education. Scholarships are awarded based upon various criteria, which usually reflect the values and purposes of the donor or founder of the award. Scholarship money is not required to be repaid.

Current status

In 2007, the RDNWPC website stated that the competition would not be held for the 2007-2008 year. The Reader's Digest website no longer mentions the RDNWPC. [1]

Past winners and top finishers

 Installment of competition  
  (academic/competition year)  		 First place (state represented, grade level)  Second place (state represented, grade level)  Third place (state represented, grade level) 
  1 (2002-03) [2]   William Brannon (Virginia, 8)  Gordon Bourjaily (Iowa, 8)  Richard Lyford (New York, 8)
  2 (2003-04) [2]   Spencer Gill (Michigan, 7)  Jeffrey Seigal (Maryland, 8)  Ajay Ravichandran (North Carolina, 8)
  3 (2004-05) [2]   Ming-Ming Tran (New Jersey, 6)  Billy Dorminy (Georgia, 8)  Levi Foster (Arkansas, 8)
  4 (2005-06) [3]   Joe Shepherd (Georgia, 8) [4]   William Johnson (Virginia, 8)  Christopher Molini (Nebraska, 8)
  5 (2006-07) [5]   Matthew Evans (New Mexico,
12-year-old home-schooler at seventh-grade level)		  Hannah Brown (South Carolina, 7)  Camille Guillot (Louisiana, 8)

See also

National Vocabulary Championship

The National Vocabulary Championship (NVC) was the first-ever U.S.-wide vocabulary competition for high school students created by GSN, in association with The Princeton Review. Thirty thousand high school students from across the United States participated in the inaugural year (2006-2007).

Scripps National Spelling Bee an annual spelling bee held in the United States

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References

  1. ↑ Archived May 3, 2006, at the Wayback Machine .
  2. 1 2 3 "Art of Problem Solving". Art of Problem Solving. Archived from the original on 2015-04-02. Retrieved 2015-03-03.
  3. ↑ [ dead link ]
  4. ↑ "Joe wins!". True Citizen. 2006-05-03. Archived from the original on 2015-04-07. Retrieved 2015-03-03.
  5. ↑ "New Mexico Whiz Kid has the Last Word in America's Premier Vocabulary Competition". PR Newswire. 2007-05-15. Retrieved 2017-05-24.
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