On the 19th February, five Year 12 Students: Mia Grady, Halli Backler, Freya Wiper, Henry Boord and Lachie McKenzie, competed in the Naracoorte Lion’s Youth of the Year competition. This involved students preparing a five minute persuasive speech on a topic of their choice, that would also interest their audience. Students also prepared an application that reflected their achievements in a range of categories including leadership, sporting, academic and cultural activities. From this, students sat a 30-minute interview during which the three judges asked them numerous questions evaluating their general knowledge.

On the evening, a Lion’s dinner meeting was held during which the students presented their prepared speeches and tackled two impromptu speech topics: ‘If you had complete control and resources what business would you open in Naracoorte?’, and ‘Jimi Hendrix once said: ‘When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace’. What could you do to make this happen?’.

Congratulations to all students, and a special shoutout to Freya Wirper who presented a persuasive speech on the ‘the importance of speaking a second language in Australia’, and well-rounded impromptus winning the Public Speaking award. A second congratulations goes to Mia Grady who won the overall Naracoorte Lion’s Youth of the Year, moving onto the Regional Final.

This was held in Kingston on the 3rd March, where Mia was up against the winners from Lucindale, Kingston and Millicent. The competition was tough, Mia once again submitted an application, sat an interview, presented her prepared speech on ‘The importance of rural volunteering’ and delivered two impromptu speeches, this time on ‘Why do you think it is possible that someone like Donald Trump is able to ascend to the position of presidency of his country’ and ‘Can you reflect on what you have learnt over the last four to five years and what advice would you give to your Year 7 self.’ Although doing a fantastic job, Mia did not advance to the next round, with the student from Kingston taking this place.