Speech team starts well at Eden Prairie
The overnight trip to the Twin Cities has become a tradition for the Cotter speech team and focuses on team building as well as competition.
The Cotter speech team left school at three o’clock and started the long haul up to Eden Prairie. The two buses where packed with kids happy to be out of school and nervous about their first meet. Lots of people where sleeping on the bus and the seniors where playing music out of a speaker they brought.
The bus stopped at Buca di Beppo for dinner. Buca is a Italian restaurant that has all you can eat food served family style. The team finished eating and loaded the buses to go to the hotel. Everyone was frantic to get to their rooms and go swimming.
The pool was packed with speech kids. After swimming there was a team meeting to talk about the tournament. The captains led the meeting and explained the rules and what to do and what not to do. After the meeting everyone went to bed. The team woke up at 5 am and left by 6. The meet we went to had about 900 people competing in it.
The first year people were nervous when they walked in After the meet and awards we got back on the bus and arrived home.
“I think it went well” said assistant coach and Cotter English teacher Emily Shriver . “The competition there is tough, but many of our kids performed above par. To improve everyone has to continue to become more confidant in our pieces and get everyone off script”.”
The team got to see top level competition, and placed 10 speakers into novice or next in finals, including 3 Duos and 4 in Creative Expression. The team beat 7AA schools, some of whom have been speaking since the fall at national meets.
“I think we were well prepared, and our captains did a great job leading the team the night before and the day of,” Amy French, co-head coach, said.
Following the Eden Prairie meet the team competed at Mankato and Wabasha. In Mankato the team outscored several AAA schools and Cotter won the Wabbasha-Kellog meet by 85 points.
Upcoming meets include Medford on March 4 and Owatonna on March 11, prior to the Three Rivers meet at Wabasha, a home meet, and sections.
