National Humanities Bee
Middle & Elementary School Divisions

For the Middle & Elementary School Divisions, students first compete in the Qualifying Stage through the National Qualifying Exam. For these divisions, the National Qualifying Exam is a 35 question multiple choice exam. All questions have 4 possible answer choices. The National Qualifying Exams for the Middle and Elementary School Divisions are scored on the basis of 2 points for a correct answer, and 0 for a question left unanswered or for an incorrect answer. There is thus no penalty for guessing, and students taking these exams should answer every question as best as they can.

Students may take the National Humanities Bee National Qualifying Exam online, at all in-person National Science, History and Geography Bee Regional Tournaments, or at all in-person National History Bee and Bowl Regional Tournaments during the lunch break. There are four versions of the Middle and Elementary School National Qualifying Exams, which are known as Red, White, Blue, and Gold. For National Qualifying Exams that are offered at National Science, History, and Geography Bee Regional Tournaments, the Exam Set corresponds to the question set that the tournament is using. If the Exams are taken at National History Bee and Bowl Regional Tournaments, then if the tournament is run on C Set, then the Red Set exam version is offered. If the tournament is run on B Set, the White Set exam version is offered. If the tournament is run on A Set, the Blue Set exam version is offered.

For the National Humanities Bee, the questions on all four versions of the National Qualifying Exams follow the National Qualifying Exam Question Distribution.

If taking the National Humanities Bee National Qualifying Exam online, students have a 20 minute time limit.

If taking the National Humanities Bee National Qualifying Exam at an in-person National Science, History, and Geography Bee Regional Tournament, students may also take the National Qualifying Exams for the National Biology Bee, National Citizenship Bee, National Mathematics Bee, US Geography Bee, and US History Bee. At these tournaments, National Qualifying Exams are not timed on an exam-by-exam basis, but rather, students can take them in the designated Exam Room whenever it is open. Students cannot leave the Exam Room and come back to an exam that they had previously started. Students should be mindful of their schedule for the day and plan the times when they wish to take exams accordingly.

If taking the National Humanities Bee National Qualifying Exam at an in-person National History Bee and Bowl Regional Tournament, students may also take the National Qualifying Exams for the other five National Qualifying Exams as listed in the above paragraph. If a student takes just one exam, they have 20 minutes. If a student takes two exams, they have 40 minutes, but if they take three, four, or five exams, they still only have 40 minutes (as time is limited during the lunch break of a tournament).

Students qualify for Nationals through the National Qualifying Exams in one of three ways:

Students need only to qualify on any one version of the National Qualifying Exam in any given academic year to be able to compete at the National Championships. If a student qualifies on one version of the Exam, and then takes a different version of the exam but does not qualify on that version, they remain qualified.

The cost is $20 per Exam Version per student.

For all questions on the National Qualifying Exams of the National Humanities Bee, please email iac-info@iacompetitions.com.