Tyrone’s speech team won numerous awards at the Winter Speech Competition at Williamsburg High School on February 27th. This was the second speech competition of the season.

Tyrone students competed against students from Juniata Valley and Williamsburg High School in four different categories: Poetry, Serious, Humorous, and Original.

Seven Tyrone students went to the competition and read from their desired category.

Tyrone Students who won individual awards include Mr. Adam Zook for Best
Serious Oral Interpretation, Mr. Shawn Phillips for Best Original Poem, Mr. Conner Stroud for Best Senior High Poetry Interpretation, and  Miss Paige Umholtz for Best Junior High Poetry Interpretation.

The Speech Team is under the direction of Mr. Richard Merryman, recently retired TAHS English teacher.

“As always, we extend our gratitude to the entire staff for their continued efforts and kind words of encouragement on behalf of the oldest team in the school,” said Merryman, “In addition, a special word of thanks to our school nurse, Mrs. Julie Patton, for laundering a speech student’s outfit at the eleventh hour!”

“I thought we we did really well,” said senior Seth Umholtz, “When your school takes majority of the awards, you know you had a good day.”

Each student read their selection twice in front of two different judges. The judges award a score out of thirty-two possible points in eight different categories, such as voice volume, voice speed, eye contact, and physical contact.

To prepare for the competition, students met with Mr. Merryman in the weeks to choose their selections and make sure any newcomers understand the rules.

The next speech event is in spring. The team is very excited to do well at the next one.

“We need to work towards the best team overall score next.”, said Umholtz.

Tyrone came second in the competition, less than a point away from the winner.