27th National Geographic Bee

The 27th National Geographic Bee was held on May 11–13, 2015 in Washington, District of Columbia.^[1] It is sponsored by the National Geographic Society.^[2][3] Soledad O'Brien was the host for the second and final time. The winner was Karan Menon of John Adams Middle School in Edison, New Jersey, who won $50,000 in scholarships, a trip for 2 to the Galapagos Islands, and a lifetime membership to the National Geographic Society. The runner-up was Shriya Yarlagadda of Grand Blanc East Middle School in Grand Blanc, Michigan who won a $25,000 scholarship. The Third place winner was Sojas Wagle of Springdale, Arkansas, who won $10,000 in scholarships. Finishing in 4th place was Tejas Badgujar of Pennsylvania. The competition started with the school level rounds, in which more than 5 million students competed in 11,000 schools across the nation. Other students who placed in the top ten include Kapil Nathan of Alabama, Nicholas Monahan of Idaho, Patrick Taylor of Iowa, Abhinav Karthikeyan of Maryland, Lucy Chae of Massachusetts, and Shreyas Varathan of Minnesota. The Florida State Champion, Rishi Nair, became the 2016 National Geographic Bee Champion. The winners of the school bees then took a written qualification test to see who could qualify for the state level competition. The top 100 or so scorers on the qualification test in each state were selected to go for the state championship. The winners of the state championship would then get $100 in cash, a National Geographic 10th Edition Atlas, and the opportunity to represent their state in the National Finals held in Washington, DC.