{"id":3484,"date":"2010-04-12T08:01:59","date_gmt":"2010-04-12T13:01:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kevinbryant.com\/?p=3484"},"modified":"2010-04-12T08:01:59","modified_gmt":"2010-04-12T13:01:59","slug":"congratulations-tori-beth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/congratulations-tori-beth\/","title":{"rendered":"congratulations Tori Beth!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"victoria_black_winner_t607\"WASHINGTON<\/span> \u2014 (Independent Mail)<\/a> A high school junior from Iva won first place in the American Legion\u2019s national High School Oratorical Program this weekend, earning her an $18,000 college scholarship.<\/p>\n

Tori Beth Black, who is home-schooled, started the weekend as one of 53 champions in the 73rd contest, which challenges students on how well they can speak to an audience about the U.S. Constitution.<\/p>\n

She advanced to the championship through three rounds of intense competition, officials with the American Legion said Sunday.<\/p>\n

In each round, students delivered a rehearsed 10-minute speech before a live audience. There was also a round where students were given a topic, selected at random, and had five minutes to prepare a response.<\/p>\n

Judges looked at students\u2019 poise, their body language, the content of their responses, their speaking skills and their knowledge of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

Black\u2019s winning speech was titled, \u201cA Rising Sun.\u201d<\/p>\n

In her speech, Black praised the Constitution as “the result of honor, freedom and integrity.\u201d<\/p>\n

She saluted the veterans who fought to defend it and challenged another generation to continue defending it.<\/p>\n

“As the citizens of the greatest nation in the world, we have seen the rays of this rising sun beam upon us,\u201d Black said in her speech. \u201cAnd in fulfilling our duty, upholding our rights, we have the opportunity to gaze upon this shining sun for years and years to come.”<\/p>\n

The American Legion began the national contest in 1938, said Mike Buss, the program\u2019s coordinator.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was an attempt to better inform young students about the Constitution of the United States of America,\u201d Buss said. \u201cWe want students to understand the importance of the Constitution and what it stands for.\u201d<\/p>\n

The scholarship money comes from an American Legion endowment. Each contestant who participates in the national competition receives $1,500. Nearly $140,000 was awarded in scholarships this year, Buss said.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s one student from each state, plus students representing Washington, D.C., and two of the American Legion\u2019s foreign offices.<\/p>\n

Elizabeth Blessing, another home-schooled student from Auburn, Ala., earned a $16,000 college scholarship with a second-place finish. Brooke Connor, of Bridport, Vt., finished in third place and received a $14,000 scholarship.<\/p>\n

The scholarships account for a portion of the $3.5 million in post-secondary scholarships that the American Legion awards annually.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2014 (Independent Mail) A high school junior from Iva won first place in the American Legion\u2019s national High School Oratorical Program this weekend, earning her an $18,000 college scholarship. Tori Beth Black, who is home-schooled, started the weekend as one of 53 champions in the 73rd contest, which challenges students on how well they […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3484","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2gEQ0-Uc","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3484","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3484"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3484\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevinbryant.com\/kbarchive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}