Stevenson (and Season) Wrapup

Congratulations to everyone for the excellent day on Saturday! What a great way to end a strong season: we got another SCOTIE qualifier (way to go, Carter!) and reaffirmed several others; almost everyone left with some bling, and the team took home second place based on the complicated formula they use over there for figuring out who wins team trophies. And what other team travels with its own groupie? All that and a rousing game of Hoopla! What more could anyone ask?

(Oh, right: ice cream on the way home. Well, we had that one covered, too.) :-)

Awards went to the following:

HDA: Brianna and Rachel: 1st
HI: Sarah: 1st •••••••• Rachel: 1st
DDA: Catherine and Jeffrey: 2nd ••••••••• Lily and Kelsey: 3rd
DI: Julia: 1st ••••••• Brianna: 2nd ••••••• Lain: 3rd •••••• Danielle: 6th
Ex: Molly: 6th
IS: Molly: 4th
OC: Jeff: 2nd •••••••• Claire: 3rd
OO: Danielle: 2nd ••••••••• Mark: 4th
OD: Vibhav: 6th
PR: Carter: 1st •••••••• Jeffrey: 6th •••••••• Lily C: 6th
RS: Vibhav: 3rd •••••••• Jeff: 5th •••••••• Carter: 5th
SOS: Sarah: 3rd
Storytelling: Kelsey: 3rd •••••••• Catherine: 4th •••••••• Lily C: 5th
VR: Julia: 4th
Wretched: Jeffrey: 3rd •••••••• Molly: 4th

This has been a really great season and I hope that everyone had as much fun with it as the coaching staff did. And it is not over! We meet Monday afternoon-not a long meeting, but still... And then there's something happening...hmm...let's see...I think it had to do with a very, very large amount of ice cream...

Of course there is still SCOTIE, and those who have qualified for that must practice multiple times between now and Feb 22 or you won't be going. And juniors who have not qualified who are interested in being Student Judges, let me know. (SCOTIE uses student judges in every round to give more feedback and to allow juniors that coaches feel are strong enough to gain valuable experience.)

And then there is the banquet and showcase, for which we will be discussing dates and options.

Finally, it's time to begin thinking about next year's leadership:

Anyone who is interested in being a captain of next year's team will need to take a bit of initiative. We'd like you to tell us why you think you would make a good captain. Put it in writing and send it to me. We will post these statements here for all team members to see and invite (private) comments at that time, so that everyone has an opportunity for feedback before selections are made.

Whoever is selected will have quite a job to do following Brianna, Sarah, Rachel and Catherine, who have been extraordinary. And that job will begin quickly, as we will want to establish a spring session to select some pieces for next year and to start working on drafting SOS, OC and OO scripts, which we can help you hone (via email) over the summer. Especially noting that we return so late next year, our goal is going to be to come back in fall of 2008 far more ready to go than we ever have been before and eager to focus on bringing novices into the fold.

That's a whole lot for one post! Some of it will be repeated later, and more info will come.

If you have questions, feel free to leave comments or email me.

--kt

Practice this week

Stevenson is our final tournament and our final opportunity to strut our stuff (and, not incidentally, qualify for SCOTIE), so let's take it seriously!

No one will be able to attend this week's tournament without practicing with a coach first.

Schedule:

Pulio: Wed, Fri
KT: Wed, Th, Fri
Freckelston: Wed, Fri

This tournament allows three entries per person if you are solidly ready (our caveat, not theirs). It also offers two cool special events: Wretched Interp and Story Telling.

Wretched Interp is the one that Jeffrey Niedermaier has done--lots of silly fun. The guidelines are these:

• Students should prepare one 6-minute program
• Material which would not normally be advisable for either Prose,
  Verse, or DI should be presented.
• Rules of presentation for the above events may be broken or parodied.
• Material may be excessively maudlin, cheesy, overwrought, juvenile,
  gushy, sentimental, etc.
• Coaches should discourage offensive language, profanity or
  insensitive material.

Storytelling is also a great deal of fun:

• Students should prepare two 6-minute programs, presenting one of
  these twice.
• Stories should be published works suitable for ages 3 through 7.
• Students are encouraged to use the books themselves and to display
  the pictures during presentation.
• Judges will be audiences of area children. Contestants’ younger
  relatives will be welcome.
• A supervising adult will compile ratings by tallying the judges’
  favorites.

If you wish to enter one of these special events you must find pieces NOW. There is not much time left to work on your pieces.

Let's rock Stevenson!

--kt

Libertville

Hi, All.

Congratulations to the members of the team who braved the icy chill an ventured through northern Illinois' best impersonation of the North Pole, survived a forty-five minute bus breakdown, and managed to stay focused through a very long day of forensics.

We had several team members break finals, and even if we did not place as highly as we would have liked to, we did pretty well given our lack of real prep time. (Next year, we may have to consider whether it's really worth it trying to get ourselves together for this tournament right after finals.)

So congratulations especially to our medalists:

• HDA Rachel & Brianna 7th
• SOS Sarah Wagener 4th
• Imp Molly Durot 4th
• DDACatherine & Jeffrey 6th
• DI Megan Pratt 4th
• HI Rachel Sachnoff 6th
• HI Sarah Wagener 5th

Our final tournament of the year is next Saturday at Stevenson. We will have our weekly major meeting on Tuesday, and it is critical that everyone who wishes to go to the tournament attends.

Have a great extended weekend!

--kt