'It gives us an audience': Forensics team reflects, gears up for Nationals trip to California
'It gives us an audience': Forensics team reflects, gears up for Nationals trip to California
On March 28, seven Threshers will compete on the west coast.
The forensics team at Bethel College has a long history of success. According to the Bethel website, Bethel’s team is ranked in the top 15% in the nation and has sent students to the American Forensic Association’s National Individual Events Tournament on a regular basis for over 30 years.
Being a part of the forensics team comes with many upsides. For this story, I spoke with Rebecca Schlosser, Isaiah Smith, and Emil Benavides — all current members of the Bethel forensics team.
They explained how the program, coached by Minnesota native Cristy Dougherty, provides them with a platform to talk about issues that are controversial yet important; being a part of the team allows them a creative outlet to express themselves; and helps foster meaningful relationships with others who are accepting and share similar interests and passions for forensics.
Emil Benavides, a sophomore from Stockton, further expanded on these positive aspects by sharing that being a part of the forensics team gives her the opportunity to talk about issues that hold very high importance to her.
She noted that her most memorable performance was when she put together a “program oral interpretation,” an event where you use all types of media and piece them together to create an overarching argument. This piece explored the double standard women have to face by using a monologue from Gone Girl. Benavides performed it at a Convocation session last year.
Rebecca Schlosser is a freshman from Moundridge and specializes in a category known as Limited Prep, which disallows participants from preparing for their speech ahead of time.
“Forensics gives its competitors a voice to speak about whatever is weighing on our hearts, but more importantly, it gives us an audience,” Schlosser said. One of her most memorable speeches was when she got to choose an important event that the news had largely ignored: the revolutionary Nigerian Women's Rights protests.
Isaiah Smith, a freshman from Great Bend, expressed similar feelings to Benavides and Schlosser when it comes to forensics.
“My favorite part of forensics is definitely being able to share something that is important with a large, yet accepting, community,” Smith said. “Sharing the things that I'm passionate about makes me feel like I have found a community that I can relate to and be a part of, like a family.” Smith’s favorite performance is a poetry piece that talks about the oppression shown towards the non-binary community.
And, of course, an exciting and special part of being on the team is getting to travel to compete with — and hear the voices of — individuals from different colleges and universities around the country.
On March 28, seven Threshers will travel to Santa Anna, Calif. to compete in the tournament: Rebecca Schlosser, Isaiah Smith, Elizabeth Schmucker, Emil Benavides, Denzel Dixon, Lucy Buller, and Emily Guldner. They have all earned a spot at Nationals and will perform in under a week.
“Forensics gives its competitors a voice to speak about whatever is weighing on our hearts, but more importantly, it gives us an audience.”
Rebecca Schlosser
As one could imagine, the Nationals tournament comes with heightened stress and pressure since it’s an exclusive, competitive competition that requires one to qualify in order to even be included. Therefore, an immense amount of time, patience, dedication, hard work, and preparation has gone into each individual’s speech that they will give at the tournament.
Benavides, Schlosser, and Smith noted that everything leading up to Nationals is used as practice or preparation. Each member of the team that will be competing on this stage has spent considerable time rewriting and preparing for whatever event they will perform.
And while each member of the team would love to win, the idea of even getting to spend a week in California with the people they love, for an activity that they are passionate about, makes it all worth it — regardless of the outcome.