Seward High Junior Named First Place in Youth Sesquicentennial Speech Contest

December 12, 2016

Seward High Junior, Chase Prochnow of rural Seward-near Staplehurst, was selected the First Place speaker of the finalist’s presentations at the recent Nebraska Sesquicentennial Student Oratorical Competition held on Saturday, December 10, 2016 sponsored by the GFWC Nebraska Federation of Women’s Club’s Inc.(NFWC)-the official state affiliate of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs, INC (GFWC)  and Nebraska Rotary Clubs with Rotary International.  He is the son of Mike and Cami Prochnow.  The event was held in Seward, Nebraska at the Seward Civic Center. 

Other state finalists and named First Runner-up at the contest was Evan Mettenbrink, a senior at Seward High, along with Second Runner-up Ruthie Isaacson, a freshman at Gretna High School.  The oratorical competition invited high school students to write and present a speech-ten minutes or less, on some aspect of the approaching Nebraska Sesquicentennial “Reflecting, Celebrating, Inspiring and Embracing Nebraska’s 150^th Anniversary of Statehood…to reflect on who we were, celebrate who we are and inspire future generations, while embracing our cultural differences!”

Both Prochnow and Mettenbrink were sponsored officially by the Seward Rotary Club, GFWC Seward Junior Women’s Club and GFWC Seward Woman’s Club-along with the School District of Seward, High Ability Learner Program.  Isaacson was sponsored by the School District of Gretna.

Each student was introduced anonymously to avoid any prejudice and shared their speech/presentation at the Seward Civic Center to a representative panel of qualified judges from the sponsoring organizations. As overall champion of the contest, Prochnow was awarded $150 check from the Arts Council, the First Place trophy, certificate and medal.  Each of the other two finalists also received a trophy, certificate and medal.  All three finalists were encouraged and have agreed to serve as part of an informal Youth Speakers Service, and are willing to promote the Nebraska Sesquicentennial- presenting their speech whenever possible, especially at the various Nebraska Sesquicentennial events in 2017.

Serving as judges for the event were Jim Pink-Rotary International Rotary Youth Leader Award (RYLA) co-chair 2016 for Rotary District 5565, Bonnie Kruse-Past President of the GFWC Nebraska Federation of Women’s Clubs, Inc. and Anthony Wolter of Saginaw, Michigan, an education major and student at Concordia University, in Seward.  Jon Kruse, with Rotary International served as the tabulation coordinator for the contest.  Jean Kolterman, Past President of the GFWC Nebraska Federation of Women’s Clubs, Inc. coordinated the arrangements and served as the official scorer and timer for the contest.  She also serves as the current Fine Arts Chairman for the GFWC NFWC.  The check for $150 was presented by Phil Bangert, who is a member of the Nebraska Friends of the Nebraska Sesquicentennial/ and Nebraska Sesquicentennial Foundation.

The contest information was promoted by the various service clubs in Nebraska and the Nebraska School Activities Association –NSAA, thorough the office of Deb Velder who made the contest information available to each speech/drama contact in Nebraska.

Speaker requests for the students concerning a possible speaking engagement with their speech during 2017 should contact Clark Kolterman, at clark.kolterman@sewardschools.org or call him at 402-643-6138.