Published Wednesday, June 28th, 2023
Participants in Wayne State’s Speech Camp were able to research and practice their competitive speech projects in all categories recognized by the Nebraska School Activities Association.
Helping high school students with their competitive speech projects for the upcoming school year was the goal of Wayne State College’s first Speech Camp on June 21-24.
Designed to give participants a “leg up” on their competition this fall, Wayne State’s Speech Camp covered sessions on all categories recognized by the Nebraska School Activities Association. They were script cutting and selection, visual aid creation, advanced speech writing, and one-on-one coaching in Public Address Events (Entertainment, Persuasive, Informative), Limited Preparation Events (Extemporaneous), and Interpretation Events (Humorous and Serious Prose, Duet Acting/Duo Interpretation, Poetry, and Program Oral Interpretation).
Jonathan Laner, head coach of Wayne State’s forensics team, said giving camp attendees a jump start on their upcoming season was a pleasure.
“I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with these talented kids,” said Laner. “These students are going home with new skills and tricks to take back to their teams that will benefit their upcoming season. I can’t wait to follow their progress and see where their events take them.”
“We received some excellent feedback from the students about our first Speech Camp,” added Laner. “Their feedback will be instrumental when we plan next year’s camp.”
Laner wasn’t the only mentor helping students during Speech Camp.
Brayden Almgren, a member of Wayne State’s forensics team and counselor for the camp, echoed Laner’s comments about helping the students.
“Working with these students has been so much fun and seeing them grow as speakers has been an eye-opening experience for me,” said Almgren, a junior from Spencer. “Coach Laner tells us to ‘speak the truth’ and that’s what these kids have done all week. Seeing the passion for the topics and scripts they have chosen has been wonderful.”
“This camp also helped me become more knowledgeable with how events work,” added Almgren. “I’m becoming more prepared for when I coach my own team someday.”
Camp participants were Jemma Crosier, Auburn; Addison Fankhauser, Auburn; Jacob Gill, South Sioux City; Jessica Jackson, Schuyler; Olivia Klein, Elgin; Benjamin Kleinschmit, Hartington; Addison Krupka, Howells; Juliana McNally, Elgin; and Ashlyn Simonson, Mullen.
For more information about speech and other communication arts opportunities at Wayne State, visit the WSC Communication Arts page.