Manti High takes two firsts and scores in top five in speech events

12-19-2019

PRICE—Manti High took two first places and scored in the top five in several events in a meet last Saturday, Dec. 13 at Carbon High School in Price.

The meet was part of the Central Utah Speech and Debate Circuit, series of meets in Carbon, Sanpete, Sevier and Emery counties. The meets don’t count toward the region and state titles, but they help prepare students for those competitions.

The Manti speech and debate team took fourth in 3A last year, but lost a lot of competitors because of seniors graduating, said Coach Eric Petersen.

“We’ve got a lot of new students who are helping build the team back up. Hopefully we’ll be right back there this year,” Petersen said.

At the Carbon meet, Gracie Keisel, a senior, placed first in Lincoln-Douglas Debate in her very first debate meet ever, while Taylor Palmer placed first in foreign extemporaneous speaking.

Other top finishers were Ephiny Lees, who took fifth in Lincoln-Douglas; Avery Allred, who was third in dramatic interpretation; a team of Taylor Palmer and Nathan Palmer, who took third in public forum; and a team of Mark Olsen and Kyle Olsen, who took fourth in public forum.

Donald Southworth took third in original oratory, while Nathan Howell was fourth and Nathan Palmer fifth in spontaneous argumentation. In national extemporaneous speaking, Kyle Olsen took fourth and Mark Olsen fifth.

Manti supplied five judges for the meet, many of them graduates from last meets.

Peterson said the students wanted to thank Ken Sorensen, the bus driver, who got them safely over a mountain pass in a snowstorm.