Posted on 03/07/2016
Attitude is a little thing that makes a big
difference. At least, that’s what the eminent statesman Winston Churchill was
quoted as saying. In February, Saeger Middle’s Elena “Lanie” Sanders won the
National Churchill Museum’s Middle School Speech Contest, proving that a little
positive, hard-working attitude can lead to big things.
This year, the annual contest hosted by the
National Churchill Museum in Fulton, Missouri was held on Feb. 15, 2016. In
order to qualify for the contest, students must first win a local tournament.
So Lanie competed against other students from the St. Louis Metro, along with
students from the Kansas City and Springfield areas.
“Winning was a rush of excitement,” Lanie
said, a seventh grader at Saeger. “This has been a great learning experience
for me.”
Teresa Maher teaches Spectra, which is a program specifically tailored
for students identified as gifted. Maher knows how valuable these types of opportunities
are for students. “Giving students the chance to speak publically,” Maher said,
“and in front of an audience of strangers, is a life skill that they can take with
them long after the public school days are done. It gives them a chance to
take pride in their written work and to inspire people with their own
words. There’s an irreplaceable value in that.”
Lanie will deliver her speech again on March
31, at the Missouri State Capitol, in honor of Fine Arts Education Day. She
will then offer an encore when she performs the speech on Sunday, April 10 at
the prestigious annual Churchill Kemper Brunch and Lecture.
Churchill, regarded as one of the greatest
public speakers of all time, was giving a speech to the British House of
Commons in 1904 when he was 23 years old. He forgot his speech, left the
podium, and buried his head in his hands in shame. What if he gave up then?
What kind of world would we live in if his inspirational words never reached
our ears? What if he didn’t have a hard-working attitude? Churchill kept
working at his speech skills, and the rest is literally history.
“I love that the Winston Churchill Museum
hosts this contest every year,” Maher said. “He was such a dynamic leader and
speaker, and I like that these students learn about him and see the relevance
and power of his words.”
Lanie, like Churchill, kept working hard
until she had her speech down pat enough to be the best in the state. “The
topic is something I am passionate about,” Lanie said. “I want others to know
the value of having a hard working attitude.”
Churchill once said that the “Empires of the
future are the empires of the mind.” With minds like Lanie’s, the empires of
the future look pretty bright.