Riley Metcalfe, center, won the statewide civics championship at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, S.C., on Thursday, July 23, 2026. (Photo by Skylar Laird/SC Daily Gazette)
COLUMBIA — The room went silent as seven middle school girls considered the question: What distinguishes intellectual virtues from moral virtues in Aristotle’s “Nicomachean Ethics”?
If that sounds much more difficult than a typical middle school civics course, that’s because it is. The question was one of 20 similar questions the seven would go on to answer as part of a statewide civics championship, some of which stumped even former Gov. David Beasley, who moderated.
“I started thinking, ‘Sure glad I’m not up there,’” Beasley said. “I don’t know if any members of the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House, the White House could answer a lot of these questions.”
Riley Metcalfe, a rising ninth grader from Greenville, won the competition Thursday, securing a spot representing the state in the National Civics Bee later this year.
“It’s going to be competitive, but I’m really excited to go out there and represent South Carolina and hopefully make a difference,” Metcalfe told reporters afterward.
Metcalfe also won a $1,000 cash prize. The winner of the national competition, which does not yet have a date, will go home with $100,000 to put toward their college education.
Second place receives $25,000, and third place gets $15,000.
This is the first year since the contest began in 2022 that students from all 50 states will compete for the grand prize. South Carolina was one of 10 states, plus American Samoa, to host its first civics bee this year.
South Carolina didn’t have a bee until this year because the national organization needed a state-specific organizer. When Mary Capers Bledsoe, who oversees the state’s Youth in Government program, heard about the idea, the YMCA of Greenville seemed like a perfect fit to take charge, said the event organizer from Greenville.
After all, the YMCA already runs the annual Youth in Government program, which sends students from across the state to Columbia for a weekend to create their own model Legislature.
“Our mission is to help create, specifically, engaged young people,” Bledsoe said. “So, we already were in the civics education world.”
Middle school students will get to continue competing in the coming years, Bledsoe said, with hopes to continue growing the program and reaching more students.
“We are looking forward to bigger and better, more young people, more regional bees next year,” Bledsoe said. “We can’t wait to see where this goes.”
Unlike a spelling bee, where students are knocked out through on-the-spot questions, the civics competition begins with an essay contest. A national committee chooses the strongest essays from each state, and those students go on to compete in live exams.
More than 100 South Carolina middle schoolers submitted essays to the national committee, which chose around 50 finalists to compete in separate contests, held in Aiken and Barnwell. All 10 winners happened to be girls.
Seven of them competed Thursday for the chance to represent the state on the national stage.
For the first two rounds of the statewide competition, the finalists answered multiple choice questions about civics, touching on topics such as the rules of Congress, the contents of the U.S. Constitution and general history.
Knowing “the fundamental building blocks that make a successful society” is essential, especially for young people, Beasley said. Amid increasing polarization and misinformation, hearing from middle school students interested in understanding the basics of government is refreshing, he said.
“You hear these young women articulate the answers that they have delivered in such an extraordinary way,” Beasley said. “It gives you hope about the future of America and the rest of the world.”
After answering questions, contestants presented the subject of their essays to a panel of judges. This year’s prompt asked students to consider an issue in their community and how they would fix it, touching on the fundamental principles of civics laid out in the Constitution.
Students’ presentations covered a diverse range of issues, including high crime rates, crumbling tennis courts, bullying, student mental health and a lack of access to advanced classes in rural areas.
Metcalfe’s essay focused on high-speed internet access in rural areas. Although the state has focused on ensuring people across the state have access, officials could do more to make sure people have and know how to use devices that connect to the internet, Metcalfe argued.
She proposed donating refurbished technology to people in low-income communities, creating public hotspots for people to use and offering free classes on how to use a computer and safely navigate the internet.
“In our current digital age, technology is not a luxury but a necessary utility vital for daily life,” Metcalfe said in her presentation. “Access to online resources is fundamental for our society to maintain a strong democracy.”
Judges combined students’ scores from the multiple-choice section with their performance in the presentation. Metcalfe, who was ahead when presentations began, took first place.
Sarah Tadamatla, from Barnwell, took second, while Emma Thomas, from Greenville, went home with third.
Despite leading the competition heading into the final round, Metcalfe was still shocked to hear her name announced at the very end, she said.
“There was such great competition,” she said. “Everyone is so incredibly amazing and smart, and I really did not know who was going to win, so I was on the edge of my seat.”
Metcalfe spent months reviewing study guides on the history of government, the foundational principles of civics and the Constitution in preparation for the contest Thursday. The most challenging questions for her were ones relating historical documents to modern politics, she said.
“I’ve learned an incredible amount of civics knowledge that I never knew before,” Metcalfe said. “I now know a lot more about just how our government works.”
But the preparation didn’t end with knowing the history of the nation’s government. Metcalfe also had to prepare her presentation, which required getting comfortable speaking in front of judges and crowds of strangers.
Beyond the national competition, Metcalfe expects that knowledge to come in handy in her future, she said.
She’s considering studying law or political science, with a potential future career as president.
“I think that we need some stronger leaders, and I think that being involved in government doesn’t have to be for personal interest,” Metcalfe said. “It can be really for public health and to make the community a better place.”
Courtesy of South Carolina Daily Gazette
