Nathan Lazor (grand prize), Jennifer Henry (1st place), Craig White (2nd place) and Kimberly Welenc (finalist)

Four students from UF were selected as finalists for the Japan-American Society of Central Ohio’s (JASCO) Japanese Language Speech Contest at The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. They competed against eight other finalists on Saturday, March 7, and earned the top three awards at the contest.
   
To enter the 2009 Japanese Language Speech Contest, each student was required to write an original three-minute speech in Japanese, practice it and record it on tape. A manuscript written in Japanese also was required with each submission.
 
Only high school and college students studying Japanese, who have not lived in Japan for more than six months and do not come from homes where Japanese is spoken, were eligible for the competition. University and high school finalists competed separately.

According to Hiroaki Kawamura, Ph.D., chair of the department of language and culture and associate professor of Japanese, all students of the Japanese program who have studied Japanese for more than one year are strongly encouraged to participate in the speech contest because the process is more important than the result. The experience of writing the speech in Japanese and practicing reading it out loud is beneficial in the learning process.

During the March 7 competition, finalists were required to deliver their memorized speeches in Japanese on a stage in front of an audience. That was followed by a non-rehearsed question-and-answer session with the judges.

Sophomore computer science and Japanese major Nathan Lazor earned the grand prize; sophomore Japanese education major Jennifer Henry earned first place; sophomore English and Japanese major Craig White earned second place; and freshman TESOL and Japanese major Kimberly Welenc also was a finalist.

“I enjoyed it a lot,” said Lazor. “I tried to make use of what I had learned in my high school public speaking class to help me reach the audience, which was challenging and fun at the same time. Last year was my first year doing something like this, so this year I made sure that I learned from my previous mistakes and tried my best to represent The University of Findlay the best I could.”