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CUMBERLAND – Three Cumberland High School students are bringing trophies home from their state competition.

Emily Eroh, Levi Dayton and Addison Carney participated in the State Forensics Competition on Saturday, March 25. All three students are in their second year on the team and gave their best performances.

Forensics is similar to debate teams and theater. Each student chooses a category and competes with their prepared speeches. It can be a dramatic, humorous or original work. The students perform their speeches in multiple rounds and a winner is decided at the end.

More about the Cumberland High team

Addison is a sophomore and placed first place in the state for original oratory. She chose to write her speech on teens’ mental

health and supporting the student body. She loves that her first place meant that her hard work paid off and the message from her speech meant something to people.

“There are not a lot of outlets to express writing,” Addison said. “I love being able to shed light on subjects and use my writing and my voice while also strengthening my public speaking skills.”

Levi is a junior and placed fourth in the dramatic category. Even though he didn’t place in the top three, he was proud of what he accomplished. He pulled his speech from “Frankenstein” by Mary Shelley and worked on interpreting the character’s feelings and how to layer the scene.

“You still get to act but you get to choose what piece to do,” Levi said. “I like to read and be like ‘wow I can use this’.”

Emily is a sophomore and placed fifth in the humorous category. This year’s competition was a different experience competing solo in the humorous category instead of dramatic with a partner the previous year. Emily worked on putting the piece together with different voices and felt that the performance was the best that she could give.

According to Levi, this can be an interesting experience as the regional competition has the dramatic and humorous categories compete in the same room giving a roller coaster of emotions. He remembers leaving the dramatic room at state feeling very heavy from all the performances and hearing the humorous teams laughing next door.

About the competition

The students participated in Class 1 with 20 other teams divided into the categories. According to Emily, this competition is a great way to meet new people and get out of your comfort zone.

Unfortunately, there is not an opportunity to participate in a national competition, but the three are more than pleased with the results at states and look forward to preparing for next year. They wanted to thank their teachers and coaches for pushing them and helping them get this far on the team.