Students Get Head Start on Fall Competition at 2024 Speech Camp

Thanks in part to Wayne State College’s Summer Speech Camp, more than 20 Nebraska high school students received a jump start with their competitive speech projects for the upcoming school year.

Designed to give participants a “leg up” on their competition this fall, Wayne State’s Summer Speech Camp covered sessions on all categories recognized by the Nebraska School Activities Association. They were script cutting and selection, visual aid creation, advanced speech writing, and one-on-one coaching in Public Address Events (Entertainment, Persuasive, Informative), Limited Preparation Events (Extemporaneous), and Interpretation Events (Humorous and Serious Prose, Duet Acting/Duo Interpretation, Poetry, and Program Oral Interpretation).

Jonathan Laner, head coach of Wayne State’s forensics team, said giving camp attendees a jump start on their upcoming season was a pleasure.

“The feedback we received during last year’s camp was tremendous,” said Laner. “It gave us a great blueprint for planning this year’s camp. Everyone is excited to learn techniques that will give them an advantage during their competitions for the upcoming school year. I’m grateful for the opportunity to work with these talented high school kids.”

Laner wasn’t the only mentor helping students during Speech Camp.

Wayne State senior Jadyn Burenheide, a member of Wayne State’s forensics team and counselor for the camp, echoed Laner’s comments about helping the high school students.

“Working with these kids for a week and brainstorming with them to develop topics for their speeches is a fantastic experience,” said Burenheide, an English Language Arts Education major from Howells. “It’s very rewarding to help them achieve their goals and see the passion they have for competitive speech.”

Camp participants were:

• Albion – Makenna Devine, Lexi Osborn
• Atkinson – Ian Cambras, Olivia Rentschler
• Aurora – Lena Groetzinger
• Dodge – Annemarie Slaughter
• Dorchester – Megan Gordon
• Elgin – Jovie Borer, Juliana McNally
• Elkhorn – Ellie Cain
• Hastings – Hayden Feigner
• Howells – Isabel Belina, Adyson Krupka
• O’Neill – Suhani Chaudhari, Tucker Cook, Maya Ochidi
• Petersburg – Aiden Klein, Olivia Klein
• Plattsmouth – Joel Moore, Jaxon Sharp
• Sidney – Dru Weimer
• Sutton – Shae Eggers
• Wayne – Harper Olson

For more information about speech and other communication arts opportunities at Wayne State, visit the WSC Communication Arts Department.