Jefferson High science teacher Kayla Feistner took on a tall order when she agreed, as coach of the school’s speech, debate and drama team, to host last weekend’s divisional meet.
Yet she not only succeeded, but her team nearly pulled off a clean sweep – nine out of 10 JHS’ competitors are headed to the state meet in Townsend this weekend.
In her third year as coach, Feistner had yet to organize a meet at Jefferson High, which had not hosted a meet since the 2022-2023 debate season. And the divisional meet, which is the final step before the state meet at Broadwater High Jan. 30-31, is much larger than a regular season meet.
First, the organizer needs to find, train and confirm the appropriate number of volunteer judges to oversee and rule on each individual competition. For this divisional meet, which involved 157 competitors from 17 schools, Feistner needed 45 volunteer judges – and was able to find them relatively quickly thanks to strong local support.
“Our team went to family and family friends and told them that we need help finding judges to make this event happen,” said the coach, who also put notices on social media and the school’s weekly event update to parents and the community.
“We had the judges to run the event within a few short weeks,” Feistner added. “Having the overwhelming amount of support from our community here in Boulder has been amazing and because of that support one of the most stressful aspects of planning a speech and debate event was taken care of.”
Next, host schools need adequate space for the competitions in each category, with this year’s event requiring nearly 30 rooms in all. “I was able to reach out to Boulder Elementary and use some of their space to help host,” said Feistner, adding that the competition was split between JHS (22 rooms) and the elementary school (seven rooms), with the finals taking place in the former.
In the end, the event came off without a hitch, and Feistner credited the invaluable assistance of her fellow coaches with meet-hosting experience.
“I can say with 100% certainty that I would not have been able to pull off this meet without the help of the other coaches that I have met,” she said. “Their support and patience with my million questions helped me format, set-up, and be ready for the day of the event.”
Best of all, Jefferson High had a great showing, sending all but one of its competitors to state, nearly doubling last year’s tally (five out of 7). The top Jefferson High performers were Kale Strozewski and Faith Yager, who took 2nd place in Public Forum Debate, Roraleigh Rasmussen, 2nd in Impromptu, and Natalie Russ, who nabbed 4th in Original Oratory.
In addition, Victoria Campbell (7th in Impromptu), Annabelle Craft (7th in Extemperaneous Speaking), Hudson Hill (8th in Impromptu), Juliet Bell (9th in Original Oratory), and Kaylee Ritche (11th in Original Oratory) will also compete at state.
“After their entire season, I’m not so surprised because they’ve been excelling and really pushing for it,” Feistner said early Tuesday, adding that the team plans to fine-tune their speeches and skills in the lead-up to the Friday-Saturday competition.
While each is hoping for a state title, their coach felt they had all already succeeded – especially since five out of the 9 headed to state are in their first year on the team.
“It’s amazing what they’ve done – it’s hard making it to state,” said Feistner. “I just think they should be proud, and go in and give their all.”
