Stand and deliver: McKinney student shows what it takes to be an orator

When it comes to prepping for a public speaking debut, Angelle Halvorson suggests sticking three fingers in your mouth and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.

"It helps loosen up the muscles in your mouth so that you can annunciate better," said Angelle, 17. "It looks ridiculous and you get wonderful stares, but it works."

On Thursday, the McKinney resident joined nearly 300 students from around the Metroplex and beyond for 12 hours of speech and debate competition at North Dallas Community Bible Fellowship. Heading home around 9 p.m., she would be back at 7:30 the next morning to do it all again, hopefully walking away with a trip to regionals next month.

Sponsored by the National Christian Forensics Communication Association (NCFCA), this week's tournament consisted of students between the ages of 12 and 18 who are at least 20 percent homeschooled. The 10-region association serves as the conduit for similar competitions across the country.

With participants competing in a number of categories critiqued by parents and volunteers instead of formal judges, the NCFCA stands out among other leagues for its emphasis on promoting "real world communication," said Kim Cromer, regional NCFCA director.

"They really want to be able to communicate; they want to learn to speak in a way that's articulate," she said. "The kids not only have to learn how to speak to the judge that's trained them, they also learn to speak to me because I'm not trained in debate, and they have to do that all at the same time. You don't get to pick your audience all the time; that's real-world communication."

In the past several months, Region 4 - consisting of students from the DFW area and parts of Oklahoma - has doubled in members. Organizers had to move last week's event from its regular venue in Greenville to a larger one in Richardson, something Cromer said proves oratory isn't just for aspiring lawyers.

"It's so much bigger than that," she said. "For us, competition is the vehicle that drives us to be able to communicate better. It's so that they can go out and inform their society. They're getting to know the world around them."

While some rounds allow for prep time, other impromptu portions focus on topics the students would have to know from reading the news and being current on local, national and international events, Cromer said. There's also an extemporaneous competition, in which a student draws a topic and has 30 minutes to prepare for a seven-minute speech on it.

"They really have to understand news and they have to be fairly well-versed and fairly well-researched," Cromer said. "It's really quite impressive."

Nearly every room, hallway and lobby had a continuous buzz of activity Thursday, with students racing from one round to the next and others roaming around wishing them luck.

Angelle is no stranger to the energy; she's been fine-tuning her oratory skills in the public arena the past several years. Just the weekend before, she traveled to Houston for the Texas Chapter of the National Right to Life's oratory contest and won second place for her seven-minute speech on abortion. The victory advanced her to the national contest.

She admitted her mother "made her" start competing at first, but Angelle said it did not continue that way because she soon developed a love for public speaking.

Although participants study and memorize their scripts by heart if the category allows it, it's no lie overcoming anxiety can be the hardest part, Angelle said.

Experience, she said, is the key to success because it gives one the confidence to keep from folding under pressure. Today, Angelle's favorite competition category is impromptu speeches because of their flexibility. She's also learned to use her body language as a way to emphasize words instead of distract from them.

"It's not really a speech; you kind of make it up when you walk in there, it's still a ton of fun to me," Angelle said. "You get to do whatever you want and talk about whatever you want."

After graduating, Angelle said she plans to use her experience to pursue an undergraduate degree in teaching; after that, she hopes to attend law school.

"Debate has played a key role in that," she said. "It helps to not only find an opinion, but it also helps you to communicate it clearly. You can have the greatest opinion on the planet, but if you can't get it through to people, it won't really matter."

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