MavForensics Starting Out Strong

MavForensics has had an excellent start to the season, with three returning members and eight new faces. In each tournament so far, UNO has earned a top spot in overall team results. In two of those tournaments, the Mavs were competing against 37 other schools, and earned 3rd place and 4th place overall, respectively.

Breakout student Trinity Weers has had an impressive start to the season despite being brand new to Forensics, competing in three events right out of the gate, and already qualifying one of those events to nationals. Senior and captain Addison Parr also qualified her Poetry event to nationals in just a few tournaments, and almost every MavForensics student has advanced at least one of their events to a final round.

Last year, the state of the world introduced virtual competitions to Forensics - this year, the team is participating in a fully hybrid season which requires them to juggle in-person, virtual synchronous, and asynchronous style tournaments.

MavForensics will compete in several more tournaments this semester before the holidays and pick back up in early January. The state tournament is scheduled for mid-February, and the national tournament will be held the first week of April.

Undergraduate students from all over campus and in any major can audition to join MavForensics, and the season runs from August to April.

The competition results of MavForensics' first four tournaments are:

Tournament 1; Online asynchronous: 4th overall (out of 38 teams)

• Keith Allen - Program of Oral Interpretation - 6th place
• Addison Parr - Poetry - 5th place
• Trinity Weers - Impromptu - Semifinalist
• Baylor Winters - Informative Speaking - 6th place

Tournament 2, In-person @ South Dakota STATE: 5th overall (first in-person tournament in 18 months)

• Abigail Faris - Dramatic Interpretation - 6th place
• Addison Parr - Poetry - 2nd place
• Veronica Peck and Matthias Walters - DUO - 3rd place
• Brooklynn Schmidt - Persuasive Speaking - 3rd place
• Riley Smith - Communication Analysis - 3rd place
• Trinity Weers - Impromptu Speaking - 1st place
• Trinity Weers - After Dinner Speaking - 5th place
• Trinity Weers - Extemporaneous Speaking- 5th place

Tournament 3: Online synchronous: 3rd overall (out of 38 teams)

• Brooklynn Schmidt - Persuasive Speaking - 6th place
• Brooklyn Smith - Novice Impromptu Speaking - 2nd place
• Riley Smith - Communication Analysis - 1st place
• Trinity Weers - Novice Extemporaneous Speaking - 1st place
• Trinity Weers - Novice Impromptu Speaking - 1st place
• Trinity Weers - After Dinner Speaking - 5th place
• Baylor Winters - Informative Speaking - 2nd place

Tournament 4: Online asynchronous, 2nd place overall

• Keith Allen - Program of Oral Interpretation - 1st place
• Abigail Faris - Dramatic Interpretation - 2nd place
• Addison Parr - Poetry - 1st place
• Veronica Peck - Poetry - 4th place
• Veronica Peck and Matthias Walters - DUO - 1st place
• Brooklynn Schmidt - Persuasive Speaking - 5th place
• Riley Smith - Communication Analysis - 2nd place
• Matthias Walters - Extemporaneous Speaking - 5th place
• Trinity Weers - Extemporaneous Speaking - 1st place
• Trinity Weers - Impromptu Speaking - 3rd place
• Baylor Winters - Informative Speaking - 6th place

Current members are returning students Addison Parr, Riley Smith, Veronica Peck, first year students: junior Matthias Walters, sophomore Trinity Weers, and sophomore Brooklyn Smith, and 5 true freshmen: Baylor Winters, Brooklynn Schmidt, Abigail Faris, Kadance McDonnell, and Keith Allen.

For more information about Mavforensics, check out their page or contact Director of Forensics Amanda Goodrich at agoodrich@unomaha.edu or 402.554.6082.