Follow us on…
Forensics team the only 2-year program to achieve high national rankings
The San Jacinto College North speech and debate team, displaying some of their many trophies, includes (from left) Floyd McConnell (faculty advisor), Amanda Alexander, Tyler Cashiola, Ian Jacoby, Jesus Villegas, Austin Cain, Jason Savoie, and Leigh-Anne Williams (faculty advisor).
The San Jacinto College North speech and debate team is arguably one of the best in the nation (no pun intended).
A pair of student teams from the College recently earned spots on the top 50 rankings by the National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence (NPTE). In the latest listing, the two-member team of Ian Jacoby and Tyler Cashiola ranked 13, while the two-member team of Amanda Alexander and Jason Savoie achieved a NPTE ranking of 46. San Jacinto College North was the only two-year college in the nation with students ranked in the top 50. All the other teams in the top 50 represent four-year colleges and universities.
Achieving a national ranking in the top 50 is extremely rare and very difficult for any two-year college, according to Floyd McConnell, faculty advisor for the San Jacinto College North speech and debate team (which is also called the forensics team). “In fact, it’s so difficult that it’s almost impossible,” McConnell commented.
The teams’ “dynamic duo” of Jacoby and Cashiola has worked in tandem for several years and the two have much in common. They participated together in speech and debate as Deer Park High School students, graduating at the same time, and are now continuing as a powerful duo as college sophomores. “We’ve teamed up for so many speech and debate events that we can pretty much finish each others sentences,” quipped Cashiola.
The duo went separate ways briefly when Jacoby attended Texas A&M for one semester. “That’s all it took to make me realize I should join Tyler at San Jac,” remarked Jacoby. “I can’t say I was not learning at A&M, because I was. But the enrollment in some classes at the university was something like 300, and the instructor had to use a microphone to lecture. I was basically a statistic, a number. I prefer the smaller classes and the more personalized instruction I’m getting at San Jac.”
San Jacinto College competes against large colleges and universities in most of their forensics tournaments and consequently has an underdog image, a fact Jacoby says can work to their advantage.
“We try not to be intimidated by the talent base of the colleges and universities,” he said. “Confidence wins tournaments in speech and debate, so we try not to think of ourselves as a ‘small’ school. And, in some ways the so-called underdog image sort of helps us, because we are striving hard to prove ourselves and establish a reputation.”
The North campus forensics team is indeed establishing a positive reputation and gaining respect and recognition for excellence. The program is relatively new (it began in 2005) and team members have excelled in tournaments around the state and nationally from the very start.
Partly because of the positive reputation, the College was selected to host 16 colleges and universities as the site for the recent Texas Intercollegiate Forensics Association annual state tournament. San Jacinto College fared well in the state tournament, winning first place in Parliamentary Debate, and first place in Extemporaneous Speaking. Moreover, the North campus forensics team has won 30 awards in state and national tournaments so far during the Fall term.
Speech and debate faculty advisor Leigh-Anne Williams says the students must put in a lot of preparation, hard work, and research to fare well in state and national tournaments. “They never know the topic in advance, so they spend a lot of time reading on a variety of subjects and staying current with the news, so they can be prepared for anything,” she commented.
The College’s forensics students typically stage two or three practice debates per week. They also research specific subjects for the individual tournament events, and spend time practicing in class and at home. “For instance, Amanda Alexander presents a humorous speech about diseases affecting worldwide chocolate crops,” commented Williams. “Tyler Cashiola presents a persuasive speech about brownfields, which are communities living in areas of radioactive waste. And Ian Jacoby presents a rhetorical analysis of a Sesame Street special that features Elmo dealing with the recession.”
Because of their diligence and dedication, McConnell feels almost certain that all of the students on the forensics team will qualify to compete in the spring at the Phi Rho Pi national tournament (for two-year colleges), as well as the NPTE national tournament (for two-year and four-year colleges, and universities).
All three San Jacinto College campuses offer speech courses, but only the North campus has a speech and debate team. Participation on San Jacinto College North’s speech and debate team is open to any San Jacinto College student and team activities are part of an elective lab that earns college credit.
San Jacinto College serves more than 27,000 students in over 140 degrees and certificates in university transfer and technical programs. The College also serves the community through workforce training. Students come to San Jacinto College with various goals and aspirations and we are committed to their success. San Jacinto College. Your Goals. Your College.
For more information about San Jacinto College, please call 281-998-6150 or visit www.sanjac.edu.
Comments
Tell me what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!