The stage is filled with students ready to put on a performance and one by one, they perform a practiced piece to be judged. Before this day comes, however, hours of devoted work are required to prepare.

The speech and acting team participates in 14 competitions and hosts several showcases every year striving to go through to regional in February. Although these students may seem to just be reading pieces of unoriginal work, there is more to these club members preparation.

“We meet every Monday and our speech leaders will organize and rehearse with our sectional groups: the acting pieces rehearse together, the writing pieces work together, etc,” Shannon Valley,  speech and acting team sponsor, said. “All members will have to schedule a time to meet with the coaches and go through their pieces as well. The club meetings happen once a week, but there is an expectation that the students are rehearsing throughout the week on their own as well.”

The preparation for competitions can take up to 10 hours with finding a piece relating to their section, cutting it down, and practicing it, Valley said.

“Although it is very time consuming, this club is also very flexible because you get to choose what days and hours you practice your pieces,” Claire Enk, one leader of the speech and acting team, said. “We all have lives outside of this club, if someone had a lot going on one week they can just practice more the next week. It’s really up to them how much they want to prepare as long as they are ready by the time competitions come around.”

In order to prepare, the students usually have to read over their pieces to the point where he or she has basically memorized it, but this could mean several hours of practice each week–which does ask a lot of a student, according to Valley.

“I think students participate in this club because they want to improve their public speaking skills or compete with the skills they may already have with public speaking,” Valley said. “They see the structure of the tournament and how stiff our competition is and are motivated to do the best they can to show off how hard they’ve worked.”

This dedication to learning these pieces and performing them perfectly has helped students become stronger, more confident individuals as well, Valley said, like Enk.

“I decided to join speech and acting team because I was looking for a way to get involved in school and to make friends. Joining this club has helped to boost my self confidence a lot,” Enk said. “I used to be a very shy freshman who didn’t volunteer in class or look people in the eyes, and now I’m performing independent pieces in front of an audience. I’m so thankful for what this club has done for me.”