On Saturday, January 31st, the Fair Grove Speech Team competed at the Middle Lakes Conference Speech Tournament. This tournament took place in Strafford and the Fair Grove team received first place overall. Fair Grove competed against a total of five schools from within the district.

The Fair Grove Speech Team placed in every event that they were entered into, winning overall sweeps as well. Gus Irvine (12), who placed 1st in Original Oratory, 2nd in Radio Speaking, and 3rd place in Improv with partner Luke Cockroft, said that he enjoyed performing at the tournament and that the team did very well. Cockroft also received 2nd place in Storytelling. Fair Grove Speech and Theatre teacher, Jamie Deckard, commented that the team did well overall throughout the entire competition. ¨The kids need this excitement to finish out the year strong… We have an incredibly tough district. Several of the pieces are strong though, and I hope that we can break into finals in a few events¨, Deckard says in regards to the upcoming district speech tournament.

Claire Foster (12) is part of the Reader’s Theatre and said that they will have practices four times a week to prepare for districts. “Personally, I’ll be working on being articulate and using hand gestures”, Foster said about how she intends to prepare individually for districts. Foster received 1st place in Improv along with her partner Mitchell Johnson (12). Johnson also received 1st place in Prose.
Several other Fair Grove students placed 1st in many events including: Chauncey Miller (11) in Poetry, Courtney Deeds (10) in Storytelling, Micki Hudgings (12) in Extemp, and Dylan Appleton (11) in Dramatic Interpretation. Additionally, Deeds and Makalie Woody (12) received 2nd place in Duet Acting, Appleton received 2nd in Extemp, Mark Cockroft (10) received 2nd in Original Oratory, Ozzy Carpenter (12) received 3rd in Poetry, and Maren Gillet (12) received 3rd in Radio and Extemp.

The Fair Grove Speech Team will compete at districts on February 20th at Missouri State University.