Ashley Hunter
ECB Publishing, Inc.
The Jefferson County Tropicana speech contest for fourth, fifth and sixth graders was held on Tuesday, December 4, at the Aucilla Christian Academy (ACA) campus.
Drawing the best young speakers in the county together, the speech contest allowed the top students from both ACA and Jefferson Somerset to compete against each other for the honor of representing their county at the district level of competitions, which will be held in May.
In the fourth and fifth grade combined division, eight young speakers participated in this unique challenge.
First to speak was Maggie Walker, and her speech titled “Why Soft Drinks Are Bad For Your Body.”
Next, Azaria Morris charmed her audience with her speech on “Finding Hope.”
The third speaker was Tessia Brookins and her speech “Yuyan.”
Providing an interesting point of view was Leighton Faglie and her speech “A Day in the Life of Shoes.”
LayLonnie Johnson stirred her audience with a passionate piece titled “Superman”, where she praised and honored the role her father plays
in her life.
Jude Griffin turned to the natural world in a speech that focused on the powerful Peregrine Falcon.
Benjamin Faglie stood at the podium and spoke on “America’s Greatest Idea” for his speech piece.
Last to speak was Tre Scott and his interesting bit, “If Dogs Could Communicate.”
In the sixth grade division, nine youths gathered to present their speeches after winning their various school-wide contests.
Desmond Whitfield spoke first about the dangers of too much screen time in his speech titled “Television”.
Presenting his speech to the panel of judges, Joshua Forehand provided his speech, titled “From College to Pros”.
Drawing from experience, Waylon Peters spoke about sports in a speech titled “Why I Run Cross Country.”
Destiny Seaton reminded her audience and the judges about the importance of a single word - please, in her speech “The Magic Word.”
Using their families as a muse, two students provided personal ancedotes when Ben Gamalero gave his speech “My Brother’s Leg” and Elijah Anderson spoke on his many brothers and sisters, titled “My Eight Siblings.”
Finley Boyd offered a speech on various animals in a speech titled “Dogs, Pigs, Chickens, Oh My!”
The last two students to speak before the judges was Kyle Hamrick in a speech titled “Ferraris” and Reid Brookins in a speech titled “My Special Vacation.”
After every student had been given an oppertunity to present their speech to their audience of judges, friends, and family, a brief intermission was taken so that the judges could compare notes and agree upon who would be this year’s County-Wide Tropicana Public Speaking winners.
After much discussion, the judges were able to proudly announce that this year’s first place winners are Destiny Seaton (sixth grade, from Jefferson Somerset) and LayLonnie Johnson (fourth and fifth grade, from Jefferson Somerset).
In the second place categories, Finley Boyd (sixth grade, from ACA) and Maggie Walker (fourth and fifth grade, from ACA) were recognized.
The third place winners for the 2018 Tropicana Speech Contest are Reid Brookins (sixth grade, from ACA) and Leighton Faglie (fourth and fifth grade, from ACA).
And finally, the fourth place winners for this year’s contest was Kyle Hamrick (sixth grade, from ACA) and Tessia Brookins (fourth and fifth grade, from ACA).
With this year’s county-wide winners having been selected, LayLonnie Johnson and Destiny Seaton will go forward to compete in May of 2019 at the district-level competition.
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