The speech team will be presenting its work for the campus community during Speech Night, held Nov. 30 from 6-7:30 in GE-225. 

“The team participates in three to five tournaments at other schools each year,” speech professor Randy Carver said.

“Speech Night is an opportunity for students and faculty to see the hard work that the team brings to competition.”

Team members have been consistently placing in the top five in tournaments this year.

Four members placed in the top five at the Santa Rosa Invitational, the team took first and second place in the Golden Gate Opener and there were two members in the top five at a recent tournament in Stockton, according to Carver.

“For us it’s pretty straight forward,” Carver said about the Speech Night event.

“Hopefully, students will see some smiling faces and realize that speech is fun.”

Some examples of speeches attendees may see at Speech Night are Angela McMahon’s speech on the gentrification to prison pipeline; Kulsoom Mohsin’s speech on genetic engineering, Dema Aldabbas’s speech on RFID chips in employees and Shrijall Luitel’s speech on abuse in a rehab facility featuring “tough love.”

“The quality of the team is amazing,” Chepheren Goree, a new member of the CCC speech team said. “There is a lot of time and effort that goes into these speeches and these people are really intelligent.”

In addition to showing off the team’s hard work that they present mostly on the road, the home turf showcase is also about sharing important points of view on campus.

“At tournaments we are there to compete, but when we present at home, we really get a chance to advocate and share our intellectual ideas,” Jose Chavez, president of the speech team said.

“I will probably get nervous because when we compete there are there are only about five or six people in the room. This will be a bigger audience, but I think I have it under control, Chavez said. 

“The event recognizes not only how hard the team works. It’s for recognizing talent and it’s for spectators to see that talent in themselves as well, possibly encouraging people to showcase their own talents,” Carver said.

“I’m excited for Speech Night because it brings people from Contra Costa College together to share information about issues that are important to our lives,” Luitel said.