College wins Birkenhead Rotary Club's 'Youth Speaks' competition

A team of students from Birkenhead Sixth Form College have won a prestigious public speaking competition, as the Rotary Club of Birkenhead staged the local leg of the national ‘Youth Speaks’ contest.

Contestants from local schools, including Birkenhead School, Wirral Grammar School and Woodchurch High School, entered the annual event, which aims to test students’ presenting and debating skills.

 

Also hosts of the evening, Birkenhead Sixth Form College, scooped the top prize in the senior competition, with students Brandon Chesworth, Katie Wells and Oliver Hilton focusing their presentation on the current and controversial subject of ‘Post-truth Politics’, touching on the topic of fake news.

"All of our speakers managed to show their own individual personality rather than just reading from a script. They’ve worked really hard, and had a great support team from the rest of the debate club." - Politics teacher, Jane Cavanagh

Other themes of discussion from the seven teams, which also comprised a second team from the College of Nick Scott, Hannah Banton and Ben Harding, included feminism, lowering the voting age and Birkenhead School’s runners-up offering on the pursuit of perfection.

Head of the judging panel for the Rotary Club of Birkenhead, Glyn Môn Hughes, said: “It was a tough competition with only a few marks between the teams but Birkenhead Sixth Form College’s main speaker, Brandon, was very lively and they all knew the subject well, varying the pace of delivery and including facts, which they backed up with verification. The topic was controversial and extremely interesting.”

Key speaker for the winning team, Brandon Chesworth, said: “We were last up, so we were listening to the other teams and got pretty nervous because of the quality of their delivery – there were some really good performances. Winning has not sunk in yet really! I couldn’t have asked for a better team though. With my teammates and teacher, Jane, I couldn’t have been in better hands.”

 

Birkenhead Sixth Form College Politics teacher and organiser of the College’s debate club, Jane Cavanagh, said: “I thought that both of our teams did brilliantly. It was a very tough field this year and I’m extremely proud of them all. Brandon was exceptional, especially in answering questions from the Rotarians. All of our speakers managed to show their own individual personality rather than just reading from a script. They’ve worked really hard, and had a great support team from the rest of the debate club. Dominic Laverick helped to write Brandon’s speech and both he and Lucy have given up their time to help even though they’re not in the actual teams.”

The winning team will now compete in the District Round of the Rotary Club’s contest in March, against teams from North Wales, Liverpool, Southport and west Cheshire. That will be followed by the North West Regional Round and the Grand Final held in Telford in May.