43
Chaney speech team sees success in second year
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
In only its second year, the Chaney Speech and Debate Team earned charter membership in the national association with two members competing in the state tournament.
“It’s the highest high-school membership honor,” said James Courim, the team’s head coach.
Teams earn degrees based on participation, gaining charter membership after racking up at least 25 degrees within a three-year period.
“The kids worked really hard for this,” Courim said.
The team was revived, competing last school year for the first time since about 2006 when Attys. Alan Kretzer and Carl James, who is involved with the Alliance for Congregational Transformation Influencing Our Neighborhoods, worked with the Youngstown Foundation to create the Youngstown City School District Speech and Debate Fund, which initially totaled $10,000.
The fund raises money from the community to support the team.
Tracy Schuler Vivo, visual and performing arts coordinator, credits the Youngstown Foundation and contributors for continued support of the team that includes about 12 students.
Throughout the speech season, which starts in the fall, sophomores Chiray Chew and La’Rayja Hill, both 15, earned their way to the state tournament last weekend at Cincinnati Princeton High School.
They competed in Duo Interpretation, acting out a scene or scenes from a play, portraying multiple characters. Props are prohibited.
Chiray and La’Rayja presented “Tammy: A Coming of Age Tale of a Teenage T-Rex.”
“It’s about a girl who is part T-Rex,” Chiray explained.
She has a difficult time fitting in, La’Rayja added.
“So she kills everyone except her best friend,” she said.
It’s a comedy.
At the district tournament where students and team learned who would compete at the state contest, Courim discovered that Chiray and La’Rayja made it before they did.
“I was relieved,” Courim said. “I was hoping that someone from the team would make it to state.”
He kept quiet though, allowing the students to find out when their names were announced.
They were surprised and thrilled.
“It was only the third time we did the piece,” La’Rayja said.
They competed as a pair last year, too, but didn’t start this season that way.
Chiray competed in Program Oral Interpretation, where competitors combine prose, poetry and drama into a program, while LaRayja considered a different category.
Both plan to return to the team next year, and they want to do better than they did this year.
Courim, who competed in Humorous Interpretation while a student at Niles McKinley High School, likes that speech gives any student an opportunity to participate.
“Only certain kids can play football. Only certain kids can play basketball,” he said. “In speech, it’s anybody. If a student is 4-foot-2, he’s not going to be able to play basketball, but he can be in speech. It gives students the opportunity to compete and to be successful.”