Akash Vukoti (born May 29, 2009) is an American child

prodigy Prodigy, Prodigies or The Prodigy may refer to: * Child prodigy, a child who produces meaningful output to the level of an adult expert performer ** Chess prodigy, a child who can beat experienced adult players at chess Arts, entertainment, and m ...

, TV personality, and

motivational speaker A motivational speaker (or inspirational speaker) is a speaker who makes speeches intended to motivate or inspire an audience. Such speakers may attempt to challenge or transform their audiences. The speech itself is popularly known as a pep ta ...

from

San Angelo San Angelo ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Tom Green County, Texas, United States. Its location is in the Concho Valley, a region of West Texas between the Permian Basin (North America), Permian Basin to the northwest, Chihuahuan Desert ...

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

. He competed for a record 6 times at the

Scripps National Spelling Bee The Scripps National Spelling Bee, formerly the Scripps Howard National Spelling Bee and often referred to as the National Spelling Bee or simply “the Spelling Bee” in the United States, is an annual spelling bee held in the United States. ...

and was the first-ever first grader to compete in the bee. His first television appearance was in the

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

TV show '' Little Big Shots with Steve Harvey'' in March 2016.

Academic achievements

Akash Vukoti - Scripps National Spelling Bee 2016

Vukoti competed in his first spelling bee when he was 2 years old. He was inducted into

American Mensa Mensa International is the largest and oldest high-IQ society in the world. It is a non-profit organization open to people who score at the 98th percentile or higher on a standardised, supervised IQ or other approved intelligence test. Mensa ...

at the age of 3 and became a Davidson Young Scholar at the age of 5. He became the first-ever first grader to compete in the history of the Scripps National Spelling Bee at the age of 6 years, in

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

. He later competed in the

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...

2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

, and

2023 Catastrophic natural disasters in 2023 included the Lists of 21st-century earthquakes, 5th-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, striking Turkey and Syria, leaving up to 62,000 people dead; Cyclone Freddy ...

Scripps National Spelling Bees. This made Vukoti the only person to compete at the Scripps National Spelling Bee for a record 6 times.

Television shows & media coverage

Vukoti was featured on several TV shows, such as ''

Little Big Shots ''Little Big Shots'' (also known as ''LBS'') is an American variety television series co-created and produced by Steve Harvey and Ellen DeGeneres. The series features children demonstrating talents and engaging in conversation with the host ...

'' in Season 1 (2016), Season 2 (2017) and '' Little Big Shots UK'' (Episode 4) in 2017. He was also featured on the ''

Steve Harvey Broderick Stephen Harvey Sr. Also aired August 16, 2015. (born January 17, 1957) is an American comedian, television host, actor, writer, and producer. He hosts ''The Steve Harvey Morning Show'', ''Family Feud'', ''Celebrity Family Feud'', '' ...

'' talk show, ''

Jimmy Kimmel Live! ''Jimmy Kimmel Live!'', sometimes shortened to ''JKL'', is an American late-night talk show, created and hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, and broadcast on ABC. The nightly hour-long show tapes and is based out of the Hollywood Masonic Temple in Hollywo ...

,'' and ''The Preachers'' in 2016. He appeared as a guest on the ''Harry'' show in 2017. Akash was also featured on ''

The Kelly Clarkson Show ''The Kelly Clarkson Show'' is an American daytime television variety talk show hosted by Kelly Clarkson. It is produced and distributed by NBCUniversal Syndication Studios and features Clarkson interviewing celebrities and segments about "ev ...

'' on November 10, 2020. On September 25, 2018, Vukoti was announced as one of the celebrities who would compete on '' Dancing with the Stars: Juniors,'' a spin-off of ''

Dancing with the Stars ''Strictly Come Dancing (widely known as Dancing with the Stars)'' is an international television franchise based on the format of the British TV series '' Strictly Come Dancing,'' itself a successor to the show ''Come Dancing'' (1950–1998) ...

.''

Documentaries and films

Vukoti has been featured in

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American pay television service, which is the flagship property of namesake parent-subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is based a ...

and

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

documentaries. Episode 231 of ''

Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel ''Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel'' is an American monthly sports news magazine that aired on HBO from April 2, 1995 to December 19, 2023. The program was presented by television journalist and sportscaster Bryant Gumbel. Overview Format Each ...

'' titled “Brain Games and Mental Athletes” featured Vukoti and aired on June 21, 2016, on HBO. The BBC documentary
The Human Body: Secrets of Your Life Revealed
' showcased Vukoti's talent in the episode "Learn" and aired on October 9, 2017, on

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's second flagship channel, and it covers a wide range of subject matte ...

. He was featured in the award-winning documentary film ''

Spelling the Dream ''Spelling the Dream'' is a 2020 documentary film directed by Sam Rega and written by Sam Rega and Chris Weller. The premise of the film revolves around competitive spelling bees, which have been dominated by Indian-Americans in recent times. The ...

''.

Filmography

Film

Television

Awards

Personal life

Akash Vukoti is the son of Chandrakala Jandyam and Dr. Krishna M Vukoti, who immigrated to the United States from

Andhra Pradesh Andhra Pradesh (ISO 15919, ISO: , , AP) is a States and union territories of India, state on the East Coast of India, east coast of southern India. It is the List of states and union territories of India by area, seventh-largest state and th ...

, India. Akash has an elder sister Amrita, who is also a Davidson Young Scholar and a member of Mensa. Both Amrita and Akash Vukoti competed in the 2019 Scripps National Spelling Bee.

Philanthropy

Vukoti has donated to various non-profit organizations like Children's Miracle Network in San Angelo, Wikipedia,

Hurricane Harvey Hurricane Harvey was a devastating tropical cyclone that made landfall in Texas and Louisiana in August 2017, causing catastrophic flooding and more than 100 deaths. It is tied with 2005's Hurricane Katrina as the costliest tropical cy ...

Relief Fund, Telangana CM Relief Fund, Water.org and Kerala Floods Relief Fund. He has also donated to Bharat Ke Veer, an Indian government initiative supporting the families of deceased

Central Armed Police Forces The Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) consist of seven armed police organizations under the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India, tasked with maintaining internal security, law and order, counterinsurgency, and protecting borde ...

and

Assam Rifles The Assam Rifles (AR) is a paramilitary force of India responsible for border security, counter-insurgency, and maintaining law and order in Northeast India and in Jammu & Kashmir in lines of Rashtriya Rifles. Its primary duty involves guard ...

personnel. Vukoti has also donated to non-profit organizations the American Red Cross Society and the Government of India's PM CARES Fund to help fight the COVID-19 pandemic.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Vukoti, Akash Living people American people of Telugu descent American people of Indian descent People from Rockville, Maryland 2009 births American television personalities Scripps National Spelling Bee participants