UNO Forensics Starts Strong!

The UNO Forensics team brought home two team championships after their first weekend of competition! The team traveled to Hutchinson, KS for the first tournament of the year. We had many adventures, including a picnic in the park in Fairview, KS and a squirrel funeral at the tournament. Highlights include: Senior Tessie Stednitz won individual sweepstakes on both Saturday and Sunday and everyone on the team broke over the course of the weekend. It was a great 2011-2012 kick-off tournament! Check out results!

Saturday, September 24th:
Tessie Stednitz: 1st in Poetry, 1st in Drama, 1st in Duo with Cole Evans, 2nd in Prose. Overall Individual Sweepstakes champion!
Niveditha Rajagopalan: 1st in Impromptu, 2nd in Extemp
Stephanie Henderson: 1st in POI, 4th in Duo with Lauren Ackerman
Cole Evans: 1st in Duo with Tessie, 3rd in Duo with Trae Graham, 4th in Prose
Trae Graham: 2nd in Poetry, 3rd in Duo with Cole, 6th in Drama, Impromptu Semis
Joy Kathurima: 4th in Extemp
Stephanie Larsen: 2nd in Informative, 6th in Persuasion
Hope Stanley: 3rd in Persuasion
Blaine Miller: 2nd in Persuasion
Jacki Miller: Semis in Extemp

Individual Sweepstakes:
1. Tessie Stednitz (UNO)
2. Brock Ingmire (KSU)
3. Niveditha Rajagopalan (UNO)

Sunday, September 25th:

Tessie Stednitz: 1st in Poetry, 1st in Drama, 1st in Prose, 4th in Duo with Cole. Overall Individual Sweepstakes champion!
Lauren Ackerman: 1st in Duo with Steph Henderson, 1st in POI
Steph Henderson: 1st in Duo with Lauren, 2nd in POI
Trae Graham: 2nd in Duo with Cole Evans, 2nd in Poetry, 4th in Prose
Cole Evans: 2nd in Duo with Trae, 3rd in Poetry, 3rd in Prose, 4th in Duo with Tessie
Niveditha Rajagopalan: 2nd in Informative, 3rd in Extemp, 6th in CA, Impromptu Semis
Stephanie Larsen: 4th in Info, 5th in Persuasion, 6th in duo with Karlee
Karlee Currin: 5th in Drama, 6th in Duo with Steph L
Dan Cutter: 5th in POI
Blaine Miller: 4th in Persuasion
Hope Stanley: 6th in Persuasion
Natalie Schneider: Semis in Impromptu
Jacki Miller: Semis in Impromptu & Extemp

Individual Sweepstakes:
1st: Tessie Stednitz (UNO)
2nd: Cole Evans (UNO) and Mike Dvorak (Hastings College) tied for 2nd place

The team will travel to Bethel College over Fall Break to compete for the second time this fall. If you are interested in watching them perform, just e-mail Abbie Syrek at asyrek@unomaha.edu and you can swing by practice. We'd love to have you!

Photo: Senior Tessie Stednitz won Individual Sweeps both days. She is featured here with coach Cameron Logsdon.

Auditions for next season!

Photo: The team stopped for a quick shot while touring the campus at nationals. Do you want to be part of this crazy group? Then contact Coach Abbie (asyrek@unomaha.edu) for audition information.

Hi everyone. We speech folk hope that the first few weeks of summer are treating you well. What's going on with the team, you wonder? Glad you asked. On Saturday, June 12th the team will host our annual audition day as we prepare for the fall season. Anyone is welcome to audition, you just have to be an undergraduate student with plans to attend UNO this fall. For those of you who will be new to campus, let Coach Abbie know if you would like to meet with any other UNO groups, organizations, or academic departments. We're more than happy to help you make a day of it. Parents and friends are welcome to come along, just let Abbie know how many people you are planning to bring with you so we can order enough pizza.

If you're interested, contact Coach Abbie (asyrek@unomaha.edu) for more information. Hope to see you there!

UNO Helps High School Students "Speak Up!"

Photo: Two East students approach Niveditha, Cameron, and Iven to ask questions about the college experience.

Way back in November, Shelley Molland, speech teacher at Sioux City's East High School, contacted Coach Abbie to arrange a collaborative workshop between East High and UNO. On April 30th, the project became reality! UNO students Iven Mendoza, Cameron Logsdon, and Niveditha Rajagopalan traveled with Abbie to East High to host "Speak Up," an all-day workshop focused on teaching minority students how to find their voice and use it to prepare for college and the professional world.

Photo: Niveditha delivers her After-Dinner speech about arranged marriages to the audience of East students.

The workshop began with Iven, Cameron, and Niveditha performing a variety of events they used in competition this year. After each performance, the 70 high school students in attendance pointed out their favorite aspects of each piece and discussed the social themes embedded within the selections. Then, 10 East students were given one-on-one coaching time with Cam, Iven, and Niv. After some practice time, these 10 students performed their selections as their peers applauded enthusiastically. Following this coaching session, Iven, Cam and Niv shared their personal stories of what brought them to UNO, how they finance college, and what keeps them motivated to keep working hard both in forensics, and in the classroom. They answered several questions from East students, and even exchanged contact information with some students and have since been communicating about college preparation and the processes involved with applications and scholarships.

Photo: Iven, Cameron, and Niveditha answered questions about the various campus activities students can get involved in at UNO.

In this wonderful activity of competitive speech, we often talk about the importance of getting into the community and using our skills to make a difference. Iven, Cameron, and Niveditha did just that on Friday. They spent the day mentoring 70 exceptional students. When it was all said and done, one student approached Niv and said, "Everyone around me was telling me not to go to college, but watching you three today taught me I have to follow my dreams." Another student told Abbie, "College always seemed so out of reach and a little too difficult. Now it seems cool and really fun. I can't wait!" It was a beautiful day.

THE RESULTS ARE IN: UNO Forensics Places 8th in the Nation and Cameron Logsdon Wins National Championship!

Photo: The team stops for a quick picture after the awards ceremony on Sunday night. Does it look like they've been crying? You'd better believe it!

Well friends, our forensics season has come to a close and we have never had a season like this one. All year we've been asking for donations of time, money and resources so we could pay to travel to the national tournament, the American Forensics Association-National Individual Events Tournament (AFA-NIET). All of you, our friends, family, and alumni, made it possible to go to nationals this spring and we're so glad you did. UNO Forensics placed 8th in nation out of 76 schools and junior Cameron Logsdon became UNO's first national champion!

UNO Forensics traveled to the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire for the AFA-NIET, March 31st-April 5th. For those of you who are still learning about forensics, the national tournament is so large that events don't break straight to finals. Instead, the first elimination round is quarter-finals (the top 24 in the nation). From there, 12 competitors in each event advance to semi-finals (top 12 in the nation) and from there, the top six in each event become your national finalists.

This year, UNO had 9 breaks to quarter-finals, a school record (the previous record was 5). UNO quarter-finalists include:

• Cameron Logsdon, Poetry Interpretation
• Brian Robinson, Impromptu Speaking
• Tessie Stednitz, Poetry Interpretation

UNO advanced three events to semi-finals. Our semi-finalists include:

• Allison Henri, Informative Speaking
• Blaine Miller, Communication Analysis
• Tessie Stednitz, Dramatic Interpretation

Three UNO speakers advanced to final rounds (previous record was 2)!

• Cameron Logsdon is UNO's first national champion! He won Program of Oral Interpretation.
• Allison Henri placed 2nd in Poetry.
• Iven Mendoza placed 3rd in Poetry.

We are also proud to share that junior Allison Henri placed 16th in individual sweepstakes. Awards in this category are given to the top-20 speakers in the nation. Allison has joined alum Matt Eledge (19th place in 2009) as only two UNO speakers ever to take home an individual sweepstakes award.

Photo: Meet your UNO out-rounders! Blaine Miller, Tessie Stednitz, Cameron Logsdon, Allison Henri, Brian Robinson and Iven Mendoza.

Finally, for the first time ever, UNO cracked into the Top-10 and placed 8th as a school. The highest UNO has ever placed at the NIET was 13th (both in 2008 and 2009). Although placing in the Top-10 was a glimmer in our eye, we never thought doing so was actually possible. But we did it! And now the coaching staff has to cash in a few bets they made with the team. Let's just say that coach Vanessa will soon be sporting a blonde head of hair, perfect for summer! And did I hear someone say tattoos? Yes, coaches Abbie and Ryan will get inked! :)

To say that we owe this success to all of you, our devoted, loving family, friends, and alumni, would be an understatement of epic proportions. THANK YOU to each of you who attended chili feeds, bake sales, and Night Before Nationals. THANK YOU to each of you for donating to the team to make this dream possible. Thank you to Dr. Jeremy Lipschultz, Director of the School of Communication for paving our road and being a constant supporter of our students. Thank you to Dean Gail Baker (College of Communication, Fine Arts & Media) and Chancellor John Christensen for their support of our program. UNO Forensics is part of all of us. We did this together, and now we can celebrate a season that still has Ryan and I wondering if it actually happened. Here is to you!