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On Sunday, February 4, Stoneleigh-Burnham School participated in a full and exhilarating day of speech-watching and speechmaking at the Kingswood Oxford (KO) Public Speaking Tournament in which ten Schools from across New England competed in 5 different speech events - Interpretive Reading, Persuasive, After-Dinner, Ethical Dilemma,and Impromptu forms of Public Speaking. Each competitor in the tournament competed in three rounds, having to showcase skills in three out of the five speech categories, including one original speech written and memorized . The KO competition is a premier public speaking tournament in the DANEIS (New England Independent School) league (SBS being the other) and SBS has long loved competing at it.

Special notes of gratitude and congratulations to the following SBSers:
First, thank you to the two motivated SBS student observers, Cal ’28 and Grace ‘28, who cheered on competitors and sampled all five categories of speech in action; 

Second, hearty congratulations to competitors Stella ’24 and Maeve ’26. This was Maeve’s first ever public speaking competition and she scored well, especially in her delivery of her interpretive reading and original persuasive speech. Just two years earlier, at this same KO tournament, Stella had made her Public Speaking debut, where she was named "top distinguished younger speaker competing in their first public speaking tournament" of 2022. On this past Sunday, Stella continued to shine, scoring first place in two of the three categories in which she competed: After Dinner and Interpretive Reading.

Finally, many thanks to SBS volunteer Lisa Ganci P’24 who served as driver and logistics coordinator on competition Sunday.

I served as a judge and a proud SBS coach for the tournament. Truly SBS is a “small school of impactful voices.” I send accolades and thank you to all.

-Karen Suchenski, Debate & Public Speaking Coach