(Members of the Pulaski County High School Forensics team who will be advancing to the State competition include (from left) Ben Rorrer, James Johnson, and Jordan English. Mrs. Brianna Smith is the coach of the Forensics team.)
It’s not something we’ve heard a lot about, but we’re about to. The Pulaski County High School Forensics team does not spend their time going around solving crime using evidence gathered from crime scenes or insects. Instead, they compete in a selected of 10 different events that focus on such skills as public speaking, presentation, and memorizing different works.
“Students either memorize a speech, poem or group of poems, or an excerpt from a larger piece of literature (play, novel, etc.) and perform it for judges,” Coach Brianna Smith said. “These are the interpretation categories, including storytelling. The students compose and deliver a persuasive speech in categories like Original Oratory, Extemporaneous Speaking, or Impromptu Speaking. There are set rules for each of the 10 categories.”
While the program is new this year, it has been active at the school before. Previous coaches include Jeff McCoy and Susan Ficke. The team currently has 17 students who were interested, but only four ended up actually entering the VHSL competition.
“We’re hoping for the team to be bigger next year,” Mrs. Smith said. “If we can get more students involved, I feel like we can turn in a much better overall team performance. Only have students entered in a few of the events hurts us. Forensics is a great experience that will give students the chance to work on public speaking and performing in front of their peers and a crowd.”
With no team in around 10 years, what prompted Smith to resurrect the program?
“I competed in Forensics in high school, and I've wanted to get a team started here since I started teaching in 2017, but things just didn't click with student interest and my availability until this year,” she said. “To be honest, one of the major motivating factors for me this year was that we had a theater student who transferred to PCHS last year from a school that did have a forensics program, and he was extremely disappointed that we didn't have a team, especially since this year is his senior year. He approached me in December about starting it all back up, Mr. McCoy agreed to answer all of my annoying questions, and here we are!”
Earlier in the month, the PCHS Forensics team traveled to Salem for the Region competition. The team finished fourth out of seven schools, despite only competing in three of the 10 categories.
Jordan English finished in first in the Children’s Storytelling category. James Johnson and Ben Rorrer took second place in the Duo Humorous Interpretation event. Meadow Wright was named as a second alternate in the Impromptu Speaking competition.
Two weeks later, the students were back in action in the Super Regional event at EC Glass High School. This time, the Pulaski County students took charge. Jordan English earned another gold medal for Storytelling. James Johnson and Ben Rorrer took first place to bring home gold in Humorous Duo. Once again, despite only competing in three of the 10 categories, the Cougars placed third out of nine schools.
With those first-place finishes, the PCHS students will now advance to the State event.