Liberty’s forensics speech and debate team came back champions from a recent tournament at Shepherd University over Feb. 11-12.
This competition marks the first time in two years that the team has been able to attend an in-person competition. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, the past competitions have been entirely virtual with students presenting to judges — through their laptops.
The recent competition was different with a live audience and judges in the same room, making a huge difference for the members and coaches alike.
“The energy and enthusiasm of in-person tournaments are significantly different … I loved the adrenaline of performing in front of multiple people. In my final round, many team members came and watched my speech. Their positive nonverbals during the round boosted my confidence,” Lindsay Anton, who won first and second place in two different events, said.
Denise Thomas, the forensic speech coordinator, noted that the last two years had challenged the team to “work as a team and to build team cohesion and spirit, because everybody is in front of their camera, competing in their event to some virtual judges without really having an audience.”
She was grateful they had time to get to know each other outside the little office where they had been doing their presentations.
“The team was able to function as a team. They supported each other, encouraged each other and held each other accountable,” Thomas said.
The tournament consisted of three categories: oral interpretation, limited preparation and public address. A Liberty student won tournament champion in each.
Overall, the team brought home nine awards, adding to their abundant collection of awards for the 2021-2022 school year alone. The students won awards in subcategories extemporaneous, prose interpretation, impromptu, after dinner speech (speech to entertain) and poetry interpretation.
“So, we’ve been winning awards in virtual competitions, but this feels different because students came home, received their plaques up there on the stage, their names on the board … it was really gratifying,” Thomas said. “And I loved seeing the students’ excitement at being able to stand up in front of their peers and be acknowledged for their accomplishments.”
The competition days are long, from eight in the morning to eight in the evening, but the team is happy to be back in the chaos of live competitions after so long online.
“I loved spending quality time with my team members,” Anton said. “We spur one another on to consistently improve our speeches and debates. Speech and debate competitions provide an amazing outlet to leverage my public speaking skills.”
Liberty University will be hosting, for the first time, the National Christian College Forensics Invitational March 18-20. For more information, visit www.nccfa.org/
Wineman is a news reporter.