This past Saturday, the CHS Speech team dominated at the Penn High School Speech Tournament, competing against Penn HS, Culver Academies, Munster HS, and Valparaiso HS. The five seniors were the only ones to break to elim rounds out of Chesterton’s regular-season team of nine. The seniors were Dex Trzaska, Lilly Demmon, Damion Lopez, Maddi Morton, and Carmen Thomas. Between the five seniors, they earned seven first place finishes.
Trzaska, a three-year team member, championed in Informative Speaking, an event where students write a 10-minute speech about a topic of their choice. Trzaska spoke about introverts and extroverts. He’s coached by Co-Program Director Dannielle Hunt. He also competed in Broadcasting.
Demmon is a four-year senior, and has competed in more than five events throughout her career. This weekend, she won Humourous Interpretation, an event where competitors choose a play or short story and play each character with different voices and stances. Demmon also finished 5th in Programmed Oral Interpretation (POI), where she discussed the harms of OCD. She’s coached by Co-Program Director Aaron Drew in both events.
Damion Lopez, another four-year senior, championed in two events last weekend. He took first place in Broadcasting, where competitors pretend to be radio show hosts, coached by Drew. Lopez was also champion in Original Performance (OP).
Morton also championed in two events. A four-year senior, she’s found success in more than four events, and worked with as many coaches. At Penn, she championed in POI, where she drew attention to the harms of purity culture and Prose Interpretation, where she performed a cutting of Hunger by Roxane Gay.
“I really enjoyed the tournament,” said Morton. “It was so fun competing with my teammates.”
She was coached by Drew in POI and coach and CHS teacher Andrea Orosz in Prose. Morton is also involved in Debate and CHS’s IB program.
Thomas, a four-year senior, championed in Original Oratory last weekend, an event where competitors speak on a societal issue and present solutions. She spoke on the extreme ways people react to destruction in the news and presented ways to regulate that. Thomas also placed 3rd in Broadcasting. She is coached by Hunt in Oratory and the team of Drew and CHS teacher Jacob Lukach in Broadcasting.
No sweepstakes trophy was offered, due to calculation errors on the part of the Penn tabulation team. Overall, the Speech team had a very successful weekend. They have three regular-season tournaments left in February, before moving to postseason in March.
