Forensics Team turns in another successful season

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Great turnout out of student participation led to a successful season this past spring for the Bloomsburg University Forensics’ Team. As a result of this enthusiasm for speech and debate, the team came out from every tournament with awards.

Some of the results include placing third out of ten teams at the Collegiate Forensic Association Winter Tournament in Canada and having nine students receive awards at the Collegiate Forensic Association’s Annual Beach Tournament in Ocean City, Maryland.

Forensics Team is a competitive speech and debate program that allows students to compete against other universities and colleges while furthering their communication skills. Some of the different events student can participate in include oral interpretation of literature reading, communication analysis, and more.

“There is no pressure to be perfect, yet there is the inspiration and support to always improve,” sophomore Emel Rasim and member of the team said. “I also love the team itself, and the traveling that comes along with the competitions!”

Forensics Team is the only co-curricular academic activity on the BU campus that will allow students to earn academic credit per semester that counts towards gradation just for participating. The team has traveled to Montreal, Canada, Baltimore, Ocean City, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, and New Jersey.

“This team has helped me become more confident in performing and applying constructive criticism,” Rasim said. “Knowing that winning isn’t everything, and networking and befriending the other competing colleges also helped me become a better team player.”

Students are not required to have any prior experience in public speaking in order to participate on the team. Students also do not need to worry about costs because the program covers transportation, meals, and housing for each tournament.

“While winning awards is nice, our philosophy is to teach students to become better communicators,” Associate Professor and Director of Forensics Neil Strine said.