ABOVE: Fairmont High School students Vanessa Schultze, Kara Fischer and Kaycie Brookens will be competing at the National Speech and Debate Tournament next week in Louisville, KY.

AIRMONT– While the Fairmont High School speech team had a successful season, three of its members are about to take it further by competing at Nationals. The competition will take place in Louisville, Kentucky next week.

The three students, Kaycie Brookens, Kara Fischer and Vanessa Schultze all started speech as soon as they could as seventh graders. Now seniors, the students have a good number of years under their belts. They used the time to branch out and find what category they really had a knack for.

“I’ve stuck with one as my tried and true event, but I’ve dabbled in a couple of other categories over the years. That’s what I like about speech,” Brookens said.

Fischer has focused on dramatic interpretation but in her last year, she tried out duo, which she had fun with and saw success in.

Schultze has also done dramatic interpretation for years but in 10th grade started doing creative and then prose.

While the Fairmont High School speech team finished up for the season in April after sending 10 members to state, the three students have been continuing to practice, working on perfecting their speeches ahead of Nationals.

Coaches Erik and Kathleen Walker commented on the interesting way that each of the students qualified for Nationals.

Brookens was a semifinalist at the National Qualifying Tournament back in March, which was not enough to get her to Nationals. So she started looking into supplemental events and in her research found that every school that sends entries to the National Qualifying Tournament was eligible to send two people in supplemental events.

“It was definitely a long process,” Brookens said.

She needed to learn a new speech over the last month to perform in Prose at Nationals.

Schultze explained that she learned of a virtual, last-chance qualifying event that took place the first weekend in May. She was at the school on a weekend morning with Kathleen while 70 people from across the country were vying for spot at Nationals in Dramatic Interpretation.

Despite being nervous, Schultze said she was surprised to find herself in the last elimination round and ultimately was one of 16 that got to go to Nationals.

Fischer qualified the “old-fashioned way” back at the National Qualifying Tournament. She actually placed 4th in drama, which wouldn’t qualify her, but another student from another school placed in the top three in both drama and duo and since you can only go to Nationals in one category, the student’s decision to go in duo allowed Fischer to go to Nationals in Dramatic Interpretation.

“Three distinct opportunities. How amazing is that of the Association to offer that to students to have a chance to go to Nationals. It’s cool to see,” Kathleen said.

When asked what they’re most looking forward to, Brookens said she is interested to see how schools around the country do speech because so far the team has just competed within Minnesota.

“I am so, so excited to see speeches I’ve never seen or even thought of,” said Fischer.

Schultze said she’s just excited to soak in the experience and savor it while she’s there.

“The reality and truth of it all is it really is a once in a lifetime experience,” she said.

The students will compete at the University of Louisville and surrounding middle, elementary and high schools.

Kathleen said this is the most individual entries she and Erik have taken to Nationals since they became coaches in 2015.

“I can guarantee you this is the most entries Fairmont has ever taken. We feel very proud about that and we have the best students who can achieve that,” Kathleen said.

They last went with a student to Nationals in 2016 in-person and the last two years Fairmont High School students participated in Nationals virtually.

As for finishing their speech careers at Nationals, Brookens said it feels like a dream come true.

“I don’t know if I believe it yet,” she said.

Schultze reflected on how far she’s come since she started speech as a young student. She said if you had told her in ninth grade that she would be going to Nationals as a senior she wouldn’t have believed it.

Feeling emotional about the question and topic, Fischer said, “I used to practice my speech with the lights off, so it’s a big deal to me to see how far I’ve come.”

“Looking at these individuals, I’ve seen such substantial growth beyond the performance of the speech, just growth as people,” Kathleen said.

The students all commented on how much confidence they’ve gained through speech and they recommended that younger students try it out if they’re at all interested.

“There’s so much more to speech than what you think it is,” Schultze said.

While making it to Nationals may be up there as a high point of their high school careers, as graduating seniors, the students know something comes after the experience.

Brookens will attend Grinnell College where she’ll study political science. Fischer is going to the University of Wisconsin-River Falls and is contemplating studying equine studies and animal science. Schultze plans to go to Minnesota State University-Mankato as she’s interested in the music and arts department there.