High school forensics team makes it 2 in a row

Topeka Capital-Journal, The, May 5, 2003 by Matt Moline Capital-Journal

MATT MOLINE/Special to The Capital-Journal

Gridley High School students display the 2003 Class 1-A state forensics championship trophy. The Coffey County school won the title in Saturday's 46-school competition at Lakewood Middle School in Salina. Second place in the team standings went to Northern Valley High School in Almena.

By Matt Moline

Special to The Capital-Journal

GRIDLEY --- Gridley High School's boosters pulled out a pair of deuces to celebrate the Yellowjackets' second-straight Class 1-A state forensics championship Saturday night.

Instead of the traditional one-police cruiser escort back into town, GHS speech coach Sue Lingenfelter's squad was shepherded on the last eight-mile stretch of K-57 highway by a pair of police cruisers and two fire trucks recruited for the occasion. All had their sirens wailing.

"Last year it was really a big deal, the first time the school had won a state championship in anything," Lingenfelter said Sunday. "But this time, they went all out. I was really taken by surprise."

In southern Coffey County, Gridley has a population of about 350. The high school has 56 students --- nearly half of whom are enrolled in forensics studies.

Once back on Gridley's downtown Main Street, the 24-member squad woke the town up a second time --- barely an hour before midnight --- by doing what forensics enthusiasts do best: making speeches.

"It was the students' moment, so I just kind of let them have that role," Lingenfelter said.

Among the speakers was senior Ashley Hatch, who brought back a pair of individual titles from the 1-A event held in Salina: a gold medal in extemporaneous speech and a second in a category known as "serious solo acting."

Despite the forensics team's success Saturday, Lingenfelter characterized the late-night welcome rally as a bittersweet occasion, made doubly painful because GHS high school will close at the end of May.

Next fall, students from Gridley will attend classes 15 miles away at LeRoy, site of the district's new consolidated high school, which will be known as Southern Coffey High School.

The Gridley High School building will house a consolidated junior high school next year.

"Yesterday we won the state championship, and it was a sad time and very happy time," Lingenfelter said, "because they realized this was probably the last major event of the school year, and also knowing that the high school was going to be relocated."

Matt Moline is a free-lance writer in Manhattan.

He can be reached at moline@networksplus.net.