Speech students looking to districts next week

    As the regular speech season winds down and districts on the schedule next week, the Chase County speech team competed in their sixth meet of the season at Ogallala High School last Saturday.
    Speech coaches Alex Schilke and Jill Bauerle had 14 students participating Saturday at Ogallala, including Iris Robles, Annika McDaniel, Keirsten Colton, Katelyn Stamm, Paige Nickless, Kylee Wiest, Kathya Aragon, Peyton Norman, Brayan Cazares, Zach Herbert, Andrew Wiest, George Colton, Jasmine Johnson and Aragorn Green.
    In all, the team had three finalists place.
    Keirsten Colton received a top novice in Program of Oral Interpretation.
    Zach Herbert, George Colton and Andrew Wiest placed 2nd place in Oral Interpretation of Drama.
    In Serious Prose, Brayan Cazares placed 6th and also earned 9th place in Program of Oral Interpretation.
    “Gering and Gothenburg were the top two schools in final points,” Bauerle said.
    CCS was preparing to host the SPVA Conference speech meet on Wednesday this week, but it was cancelled due to the impending winter storm that was already hitting the panhandle early Wednesday.
    Now, the team is looking forward to districts next Tuesday when they travel to Bridgeport. Other C1-6 district teams CCS will be up against include Amherst, Bridgeport, Gordon-Rushville, Hershey, Mitchell, Sutherland and Valentine.
    Students will advance to state in Kearney if placing in the top three in their event.
    Co-coach Bauerle said the district meet is similar to weekly competitions. Each student competes in two preliminary rounds with one judge per round; the top six performances then compete in finals with three judges.  The three top-ranked speakers in the finals qualify for state.
    Both coaches said the team has dedicated many hours to practicing their speeches, have improved weekly and have gained confidence.
    “We are hoping they are rewarded with a well-deserved trip to the state competition,” she said.
Remaining speech meets
    Feb. 28 - C1-6 District Speech Competition at Bridgeport High School
    March 16 - Class C state at Kearney High School