Teams from The Bishop’s Stortford High School and Bishop’s Stortford College win Rotary club’s Youth Speaks competition

The Bishop’s Stortford High School (TBSHS) and hosts Bishop’s Stortford College were the winners in the Rotary Club of Bishop’s Stortford’s 2024 Youth Speaks competition, which yet again provided a stimulating evening both for audience and participants.

Participating schools in the annual public speaking contest enter teams of three: a chairman, speaker and vote of thanks.

The chairman has two minutes to open each presentation and introduce the team members. The speaker then has six minutes to talk on the team’s chosen subject. Following this, a planted member of the audience asks a question of the speaker, who is judged on their reply. Finally, the last member gives the vote of thanks, again limited to two minutes.

There were seven teams from four local secondary schools – Herts and Essex High School, TBSHS, St Mary’s Catholic School and Bishop’s Stortford College – in the senior competition.

This was won by the TBSHS A team, whose talk, “Sinister Discrimination”, was about the merits of left-handedness. Runners-up were the College A team, who spoke on “How social media has propelled us into a post truth world”.

The intermediate contest a week later, featuring six teams from the same four schools, was won by the College with their talk “Words can make us happy, sad and everything in between: why the way we use language matters”. Runners up were TBSHS’s B team with “Have you thought about dreaming?”

The judges were Rosie Howatson, Polly Mead and Nick Hyde.

A spokesperson for the Rotary club said: “The standard of presentation was particularly high this year and the margin between winners and runners-up – and between the other teams – was small.”

The competitions took place on the Monday evenings of November 11 and 18.