How to Conduct a Church Or Associational Speakers Tournament

HOW TO CONDUCT A CHURCH OR ASSOCIATIONAL SPEAKERS’ TOURNAMENT In order for a student to be eligible to participate in the State Student Speakers’ Tournament, he/she must participate in a church tournament and associational tournament. A student must place in the top five of his division (Baptist College or At-Large) at the associational tournament to move on to the state tournament. *If you only have one student participating in the association, the church and associational tournament can be combined and count as both. But the student still must give his speech to be judged even if he is the only participant in the association.

1) Recruit 3 – 5 adults to serve as judges. Anyone can serve as a judge. If you have an English, speech, or drama teacher, this is always helpful because they can give good feedback to the student afterwards. At the state level, judges represent a good cross section of men, women, youth ministers, pastors, teachers, professors, and others.

2) Determine a place for the tournament. This can be a classroom, fellowship hall, or auditorium. Wherever it is held, the student should not use a podium or a microphone. At the state level, a blank stage or floor area is used and no sound equipment is utilized. For the church tournament, if the environment is suitable, you might want to consider letting the student give his speech during a Wednesday or Sunday night service to get used to speaking in front of an audience while being judged.

3) Provide copies of the current year’s Student Speakers’ Tournament brochure. Extra copies are available from the Discipleship and Family Ministry Dept. of the Mississippi Baptist Convention Board. You also have permission to make photocopies of the brochure or the judges’ pages if you wish. Judges should definitely have a copy of the pages entitled “HOW IS A SPEECH JUDGED?” and “SAMPLE SCORE SHEET”. The score sheet is what judges use to rate each category of the speech on a scale of 1-10 (as explained in “note to the judges”).

4) Designate one of the judges to serve as a time keeper. The time keeper can also judge as well. The time of the speech is noted on the score sheet at the end of the speech. A penalty is only given if a student goes under or over the time frame of 4-6 minutes. (explained in “Note to Judges” and on #6 of the score sheet under “Delivery”).

5) Tally the individual scores. The score determines winner of the Associational drill (no winners have to be determined at church drill).

6) Give Feedback to participants. After the tournament, allow a few minutes for the judges to give feedback to the student about the speech. This time is most helpful as the student now has the opportunity to work on areas that need improvement.

7) Submit information for each student who is eligible for the State Tournament. Upon completion of the associational drill, the Associational leader and Associational office need to follow the instructions in the brochure on “CHURCH AND ASSOCIATION LEADER RESPONSIBILITIES” page, paying careful attention to submitting names and manuscripts for students before the deadline stated. Failure to follow these instructions could prevent a student from participating in the state tournament.

8) Submit written manuscripts. Written manuscripts of each speech must be submitted to the state office along with Cover Page that is filled out completely as instructed on the page entitled “GUIDELINES IN PREPARING SPEECHES”. Students will then be mailed information concerning specific details for the state tournament upon the office’s receipt of manuscript and contact information from the Associational Office.

For Questions on submitting manuscripts and associational information, contact Rene Edwards at 601-292-2383 or [email protected] For Questions on tournament procedures, speech questions, etc., contact Ken Hall at 601-292-3286 or [email protected]