By Ashley Bradley/ne news editor

The NE Campus forensics team recently won two fifth-place individual events sweepstakes awards at the Red River Swing tournaments in Shreveport, La.

The two tournaments, hosted by Bossier Parish Community College and Louisiana State University, included 13 competing colleges and universities.

In the first tournament Nov. 6, Oladipo Oyedrian won fifth place for a programmed oral interpretation, and Whitney Huska won fifth place for a prose interpretation. Overall, the entire team placed fifth.

In the second tournament Nov. 7, Huska was awarded second place for a prose interpretation piece. Huska chose “I Like You” by comedian Amy Sedaris because it is so humorous. She said the piece is about a woman’s opinion on etiquette and how etiquette rules have changed.

“It’s funny because she is so serious about it because she is so set in her ways,” she said.

Huska said that though she was nervous, she used it to her advantage.

“For any competition, I’m always going to be nervous, but I just use it as my fuel. That’s the only way to get through the round.”

The team also placed fifth in the second tournament.

“The biggest thing was that they were competing against four-year colleges and other community colleges,” said Ilknur Ozgur, coach and speech instructor.

She said the team continues to impress her, especially because the majority of them are first-year participants. 

Oyedrian, first-year member, said he enjoys being on the team. He said his friend’s speech teacher nudged him to join.

“Anne Fleischer [speech instructor] told me to come watch some videos of what they do,” he said. “I decided I wanted to do something.”

He said it was intimidating to compete against four-year colleges, but the team got through it with the help of their coaches.

“Our coaches just helped and encouraged us,” he said. “We’re a team. We just have fun in what we do. It’s also really encouraging to have a good team behind you.”