Washington speech team heading to state

WASHINGTON - The Washington High School Speech Team is proud of its accomplishments.

On Feb. 28, the team is making the trek south to compete in the Iowa High School Speech Association District Individual Events contest at Fairfield High School. The contest will feature teams from throughout Southeast Iowa such as Burlington, Cardinal, Central Lee, Columbus Junction, Danville, Davis County, Fairfield, Fort Madison, Keokuk, Keota, Louisa-Muscatine, Maharishi, Mediapolis, Mount Pleasant, New London, Ottumwa, Pekin, WACO, Wapello, West Burlington, and Winfield-Mount Union.

Alex Siron, Washington’s Speech Coach, is involved in both this team and choir. Indeed, of his 23 students participating in Large Group, 18 were also involved in Show Choir. Siron said he was proud of his students, and their ability to cope with the large workload. Over the year, the students have overcome numerous hurdles, and shown great displays of sportsmanship.

Benefits of the speech program include its accessibility. Speech can be suited to the students themselves. Rather than molding the kid to the category, it's vice-versa. Poetry can be delivered, written new, or even consist of different poems juxtaposed against one another. There are also categories for storytelling, media review, and even vlogging.

Siron touted the cost-effective nature of speech, as a creative exercise both cheap to host and easily-accessible by all students.

"There's so much open creativity and expression that students need, and speech is a great place to do it,” Siron said. “It doesn't put a ton of weight for districts to do speech. It's not like we have to buy $20,000 worth of risers. We just need registrations."

Call Marilyn Higgins at 319-368-8895 or email her at marilyn.higgins@southeastiowaunion.com