For the first time ever, the National Speakers Competition Final Round at National Convention was held live in front of the entire fraternity to kick-off Scholarship Night. This competition has been facilitated the past few years by a proud alumna of the Delta Omega Chapter at Illinois State University, Kristin Pearson. She served on the PSE National Headquarters staff for many years and has been involved with our National Speakers Competition since she was collegiate. As a Graphic Design Student in PSE, Kristin had a vision for a competition outside of the Sales realm to allow more diverse professional experiences for our members.
The National Speakers Competition presented by Enterprise Holdings was exclusively held at the Regional Conferences until the 2015 National Convention when Kristin, along with her HQ staff teammate Marcie Liebert, organized the first competition at this level. At the time, students were given only a short time to prepare immediately before presenting a 2-Minute impromptu speech.
As the National Speakers Competition has grown, the format was changed to give students more time to perfect their speaking skills and prepare for the live competition— similar to how the Pro-Am Sell-A-thon ® is conducted. This was first introduced at the 2021 Fall Regional Conferences on a small scale.
For the 2022 National Convention, over 50 students competed in a hybrid, multiple-round competition this year. Students wrote and recorded a 5–7-minute speech for a team of judges to score virtually. The top five scores were invited to compete in the final round of the competition live in front of the entire National Convention in a TED-Talk Style Presentation. This year, we asked our competitors to reflect on the theme of our National Convention—The History of our Future. Our Finalists were challenged to use storytelling to inspire the audience and demonstrate how community makes us better than we are on our own.
We are so proud of how the National Speakers Competition has evolved and provides students with the opportunity to develop their public speaking skills. To see this year’s First Place Speech, check out our Instagram Page and YouTube Channel!
