Last weekend, Eastern’s speech team, EIU Speech Panthers, went to the Frank-ly Speaking Tournament at College of DuPage in Glen Ellyn, Illinois on Jan. 17.

This was the first tournament of the spring semester, with three others yet to come.

The team has won awards in past tournaments.

Last semester, they won third place in the “team sweepstakes” during the History Tournament at Butler University.

Team members won many awards while attending the event.

Marques Brown, a junior communication studies major, won first place in the “individual sweepstakes” section of the competition, receiving the Jodie Briggs Award.

Brown said he read poems that focused on the topic of Ferguson.

“I took poems already written by other people that talked about equality,” he said.

“I usually find poems, then I find the topic based on that.”

He said the topic of Ferguson in his poems went along with his topic of Black Lives Matter.

“The poems I used where by the authors Tucker Bryant and Carvan Lissiant,” Brown said.

He won second place in the “speech to entertain” segment.

He and teammate Bethany Oxford, a senior psychology major, won sixth place in the “duo interpretation” part of the competition.

Austin Mejdrich, a sophomore political science major, won sixth place in the “persuasive speaking” section.

Mejdrich said there are more competitions yet to come.

“Every semester there are three to four tournaments,” he said. “Last semester the team went to Butler University, the Audrey Cunningham Forensics 500, the 74 Swing Tournament and the NFA National Tournament.”

Last semester Mejdrick qualified  for impromptu and informative speaking for the national tournament.

Brown qualified for after dinner and dramatic interpretation.

Tyler Kahanec, a junior pre-business major, qualified for dramatic interpretation for the national tournament.

Every semester, the team goes to one national competition, but this semester they are pushing for two, Brown said.

Stephanie White can be reached at 581-2812 or at sewhite2@eiu.edu.