By Marina Schubert
Monroe Times SOAR Intern
STOUGHTON — The Monroe High School Forensics team competed in the District Tournament on March 21 at Stoughton High School. This tournament determines who goes on to state. Members must earn two scores of 21 or higher to be able to move on.
Forensics is an extracurricular activity and it is considered competitive speaking. Tournaments can be both competitive towards other schools or members’ main goal can be to improve upon their own scores.
There are many categories in forensics, some are public speaking and others are performances of literature. Public Speaking categories have an emphasis on informing their listeners about a certain topic. In some of these categories the topic is chosen for the speaker and in other categories the speaker chooses the topic. A couple of public speaking categories are Expository speech and Informative speech which both teach their listeners about a topic or thing. There are many other public speaking categories. All of the performance of literature categories’ main focus is to interpret pieces of literature to encompass a certain theme or issue. Some performance of literature categories are Prose reading and Farrago. Both of these category’s performers must choose one or more pieces of literature to perform that fit within a theme or topic. There are many other performance of literature categories.
MHS Forensics headed to state
■ Allison Adrian, Radio
■ Jack Beardmore, Radio
■ Piper Bird, Solo Humorous
■ Lauren Boettcher, Rachel Mauer, and Oliver Jay, Play
■ Tamari Butkhuzi, Public Address
■ Olivia Carani, Poetry
■ Bella Davis and Sam Wolf, Play
■ Sam Wolf, Poetry
■ Jada Jackson, Moments in History
■ Ashton Klemm, Moments in History
■ Owen Klemm, Prose
■ Karelyn Martell Storytelling
■ Cynthia Murphy, Prose
■ Jade Myers, Poetry
■ Eli Schaefer, Demonstration/Informative
■ Marina Schubert, Poetry
■ James Wahl, Poetry
— Competition for acting was to be held this week after deadline. MHS students competing to go to state include Lilly Cherney (Farrago and Play Acting) Jack Beardmore (Play Acting), Piper (Play Acting), and James Wahl (Play Acting).
There are three rounds at each tournament and members are scored out of 25 points.
Monroe High School’s Forensics team has a very talented group of kids. At the DeForest Tournament, Sam Wolf and Bella Davis won first in Play Acting, Piper Bird won first in Solo Humorous Acting, and Lilly Cherney was third in Farrago. At the Whitewater Tournament, Sam Wolf and Bella Davis won fourth in Play Acting, and Lilly Cherney was second in Farrago. The last two years they have been Badger Conference champions, but this year the team is a part of the Rock Valley Conference. The conference tournament is on Saturday, April 6, and is going to be held at Monroe High School. The team hopes to again be conference champions.
After conference, the team will head up to DeForest on Friday, April 19 for the state tournament. There is only one round at state. Members can either win bronze, silver or gold.
“I am very proud of this Monroe team,” said Carolyn Schultz, head forensics coach and English teacher at Monroe High School. “We have a strong showing and lots of points earned this season from many returning upperclassmen, energetic captains leading the team, and many students who are in their first year of competition and doing an amazing job. I’m looking forward to hosting the conference tournament in our first year in the Rock Valley Conference.”