CHRISTIAN HEDMARK AND Nate Olsen perform their demonstration speaking piece titled “Health Benefits of Weight-Lifting for All Ages.” They are seniors who have been involved with forensics since freshman year. They received a 25/25 score for their forensic piece at the district meet in Marinette, Wis., this year and are going for the gold again at state. (Submitted photo)

NIAGARA, Wis. — The Niagara High School public-speaking team heads to the Wisconsin Interscholastic Speech & Dramatic Arts Association State Competition in Madison on Friday with the largest team in the state by numbers.

The team for years has had a history of having among the most members despite being a small school. They have consistently been in the top five for the past few years.

Typically they’ve had about 30 to 40 members but now are hitting mid- to upper 40s, longtime coach Ginger Anderson said. Anderson, an English teacher at the school, has been coaching since the early 2000s.

About 40% of the high school students are on the team. She thinks it’s great that such of diverse group of students participates in the program.

“They’re so excited,” she said.

This is bucking a trend in Wisconsin, where support as well as numbers for public speaking have dropped at many schools. The Wisconsin Interscholastic Speech and Dramatic Arts Association recently stated it has lost more than 1,800 students since 2021.

“It has been a challenging time for schools to participate in interscholastic academic sports like speech,” said Adam J. Jacobi, executive director of the association. “We are aware participation numbers among scholars are lower across the country, and Wisconsin is no exception. As we look ahead after the pandemic and recognized the dire need of developing career and post-secondary skills as well as social-emotional learning experiences, activities like interscholastic speech are more important than ever. For a school the size of Niagara to have as large a share of their student body participating is incredible.”

The association is affiliated with the National Federation of State High School Associations, or NFHS, which also governs interscholastic athletics.

Anderson credits former coach Terry Grippen with getting her started with the program. “She pulled me into it,” she said. Grippen served as coach from the 1970s until Anderson took over. “She showed me how the program worked. She was a legend.”

Anderson coaches the team by herself, but many schools have more than one coach. “We just make it work. The older students help the younger students,” she said.

She also credits the support they get from the administration, the school board and the community.

The Niagara Area Business Association, Scott Schwedersky of Scott’s Uptown Lanes and Dave’s Auto in Iron Mountain have all made donations toward securing a charter bus for the trip. The team is so large, that they don’t fit on one school bus with everything they have to bring, Anderson said.

Members of team include Christian Anderson, Mea Anderson, Brayden Bartels, Cody Bath, Emma Boverhuis, Emma Brasure, Brooke Bruemmer, Lexi Champagne, Parker DeCremer, Owen Dunkes, Justine Geldmeyer, Christian Hedmark, Mason Holmes, Ina Holt, Marley Jones, Emily Kay, Jaylynn Kichura, Alivia Kleikamp, Emma Kowalkowski, Sienna LaRock, Tommy Martin, Gavin Neuens, Bella Ochs, Nate Olsen, Abain Patterson, Aengus Patterson, Mason Richtig, Abigail Rugg, Bristol Sanicki, Mallory Sanicki, Reid Schroeder, Zach Schroeder, Cameron Schiefelbein, Dante Stachowicz, Sydney Swanson, Annika Sweig, Elesia Sweig, Alex Tripp, Mary Walenski, Rachael Walker, Brooke Walters, Addison Wheeler, Noah Wheeler, Annalee White and Davie Wren.

Many of the students credit Anderson’s enthusiasm with helping them decide to be on the public speaking team, which in the past was called forensics.

“When I was a freshman in high school, I heard about the forensics program, and I had never had Mrs. Anderson as a teacher, but some kids were talking about how much fun they had in forensics, speaking in front of other people about topics they were passionate about, and I thought if would be a fun opportunity,” senior Zachary Schroeder said. “Through this program I got to know Mrs. A really well. She’s been a really awesome coach for our forensics team. She does a great job of getting more students involved and that’s one of my favorite things about her. She’s very helpful in setting everything up and guiding you through getting all the speeches together. It’s just been a really awesome program overall and it’s bettered all of us in our public speaking overall.”

“It sounded like a fun opportunity to learn some skills that can help you out later in life,” freshman Sydney Swanson said. “Mrs. Anderson is really good at roping kids in with the fun state trip at the end of season.”

For senior Mea Anderson, having the chance to speak about something she wanted to talk about was a draw as well.

“I’ve never been the biggest public speaker since I’ve been young, so she (Mrs. Anderson) mentioned to me a couple years ago that there’s different public speaking things like forensics and one-act is another one that you can do through the school,” she said. “She also mentioned that when you get to the final round you get to go to state. It was definitely a major thing, because I’d never been down there before and that was something that I wanted to do. And between that and that I would actually get to talk about something that I’m interested in talking about, and not some topic that you got assigned for school work, that was different.”

“I love doing it,” Mrs. Anderson said. When she retires in a few years, she hopes the program continues with the success it’s had in the past.