Hindley School Teacher Wins $1,000 on Wheel of Fortune

When kindergarten teacher Whitney Kennedy competed in Monday night's episode of Wheel of Fortune, things got off to a good start.

Kennedy, 26, earned $1,000 by solving the "toss-up" puzzle in which the letters appear one by one until a contestant guesses the answer — in this case, "opening credits."

“I was the first one Pat Sajak interviewed on the show that day, so I felt like I started off well,” Kennedy said.

A self-described avid game show watcher, Kennedy has followed the show for at least the last 15 years. Ultimately her winnings didn’t even cover the cost of the trip to tape the show — she spent about $1,500 to stay in Los Angeles — but she said the intangibles outweighed any financial reward.

“I spun the word ‘bankrupt’ six out of seven turns at the wheel, so it wasn’t my lucky day,” she said. “But it was still great — it’s been on my bucket list of things to do.”

Kennedy, a resident of Beford, N.Y., underwent a rigorous audition process in June 2010 after registering to be a contestant more than three years ago. The odds were against her — only 600 people are selected each year from 10,000 applicants, according to the show’s website.

A three-step process awaited her at the New York City Doubletree Hotel, where she participated in puzzle simulations and completed a written test. She made the cut to the final group of 20, and received a letter in July telling her she could expect to appear on the show anytime in the next 18 months.

Finally, in February, she got the call, and had two weeks to arrange the trip. The show taped Feb. 10.

“I was so excited — I had a lot of family come, my husband, my mother, my aunt from South Carolina and my in-laws. We made a mini-vacation out of it,” said Kennedy.

Last week, she included news of her appearance in a newsletter sent to her students’ parents. She received an email from one of them on Tuesday, with a photo of the student watching Kennedy on TV.

She said she’ll always treasure her experiences on the show. From bantering with Sajak during commercial breaks — “he asked about our travel plans and was so nice,” she said — to getting a visit from his co-host, Vanna White, in the make-up room, and seeing the behind-the-scenes work that went into putting on the show.

“It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience and will stay with me forever,” she said.