3rd Form Students Fight for First in Krause-Stevens Speaking Contest
By Andrew Ricardo ’10
News Reporter
On Saturday, March 24, four third formers from Choate took part in the Krause-Stevens Public Speaking Contest. In Getz Auditorium, Cynthia Deng, Daniel Pahl, Pooja Pendri, and Kat Selberg made speeches to the entire third form, and were judged by teachers on both the content of their speeches and on how well they followed the guidelines set forth by SPATE, an acronym standing for “Stance, Projection, Articulation, Tone, and Eye Contact.”
The seeds of the Krause-Stevens Public Speaking Contest began in 2001, when Choate alumnus Charles Krause (‘51) spoke to several members of the Choate faculty about endowing a program that would encourage students to participate more in public speaking. This led to the establishment of the contest two years later. It was designated as a speech competition exclusively for third formers, separating them from the optional Pratt-Packard Public Speaking Contest, which used to be open to all four forms. “The idea was to create a slightly more secure [public speaking] environment for the ninth grader,” says public speaking teacher and Krause-Stevens Contest overseer Zachary Goodyear. The contest is mandatory for all third formers; they must write a four-minute speech on the topic of their choice and then present it in their English class. This project then leads into the next stage of the contest. “Every English class in the ninth grade produced a semi-finalist,” commented Mr. Goodyear. From this group came the four finalists, who competed with each other for the final rankings and cash prizes. “I worked with the finalists in rehearsing and refining their speeches,” explains Mr. Goodyear.
The finalists’ topics were completely varied, exemplifying the diversity of Choate’s freshman class. The third place winner, Cynthia Deng, wrote a speech about the implications of dreams. Fourth place finisher Kat Selberg, who gave an imaginative and informational speech on the color purple. “There was a nice spectrum of topics, approaches, and personalities,” remarks Mr. Goodyear. “I thought that everyone made a good effort.”
Second place winner Daniel Pahl said, “I would have to say that the toughest part of the speech-writing process was coming up with an idea that not only interested me, but would interest the audience as well. Once I decided on my topic, human stupidity, the actual writing came naturally.” Writing about something personally interesting was also vital to the speaking performance, as first place winner Pooja Pendri attests: “I was relating to a personal example in my life. I then wrote a speech that hopefully other people could relate to. When delivering it, [the speech] flowed nicely because I felt so strongly about the topic.” Pendri described her winning topic as a speech about “how I was sure everyone at Choate would ‘go places’ but I thought it was more important to bring a smile to people’s faces and give people hope. Success shouldn’t be measured by how much money you make.”
The Krause-Stevens finalists shared positive feelings about the contest. Daniel Pahl says that he came out of the contest with valuable knowledge about public speaking thanks to the guidance of everyone involved in the event. Cynthia Deng said that it was “a great experience to overcome the nervousness and the old fear [of speaking in public], and to try to not just make a speech, but to speak to people.”
