Katonah's Emma Spada Wins Middle School Portion of Harvey School's Annual Wells Speech Contest

The Harvey School’s Emma Spada of Katonah was the middle school winner of the institution’s 56th annual Wells Speech Contest Thursday, the school announced.

Spada’s winning entry was entitled, “The True Face of Adoption,” in which she wrote that “adoption is a good thing because it gives many unfortunate kids a better chance at a new life.”

The entire school participates in the annual event, but the field of finalists is 15.

Upper school student Julia Chatzky, from Briarcliff Manor, won among the older students, with a humorous opus entitled, “Literally, I Can’t Even….” Honorable mention was bestowed up international student Giana Yang of China, whose speech was called, “Don’t Be Too Kind about Others’ Imperfections.”

Below is the school’s announcement about the contest and the winners:

A panel of three judges chose the upper and middle school winners in The Harvey School’s 56th annual Wells Speech Contest Thursday in the Lasdon Theater of The Walker Center for the Arts.

The middle school winner was Katonah resident Emma Spada who delivered a speech called “The True Face of Adoption” which she wrote to let people know “adoption is a good thing because it gives many unfortunate kids a better chance at a new life.” Emma wrote that people should not feel bad for those who are adopted. “Your ‘real parents’ are right there with you, the people who adopted you ... raised you, took care of you when you were sick… there for you when you cut your knee or when your goldfish died,” she said. She expressed her gratitude to her adoptive parents, calling them “two great people.” Emma said she was “really nervous” about giving the speech. “I’m not a huge fan of public speaking,” she said, “but I am proud of myself for getting up to the podium to do it.” While awaiting the decision from the judges, the seventh-grader said she didn’t expect to win and was “really surprised” to hear her name called as the winner.

This year’s upper school winner is senior Julia Chatzky with a speech titled “Literally, I Can’t Even….” In her speech, tinged with humor, Julia defended her propensity to use the words “literally” and “like” in her conversations with her peers. “My friends always make fun of me for the way I speak, so I wanted to defend myself,” Julia explained. She told her audience she thinks it’s wrong for others to label her “a Kardashian-quoting, “Clueless”- loving, Valley Girl wanna be … whose ruining the English language.” She believes her style of speaking reflects positive aspects. Citing a number of sources, including linguistics professors, Julia said, “The ability millennial women have to transform the language is basically a superpower.” She said other research she found suggests “women tend to be half a generation ahead of men when it comes to moving the language forward.” She quoted one professor as saying “‘young women take linguistic features and use them as power tools for building relationships.’”

Julia, a Briarcliff Manor resident, says she was surprised she won because she thought “the other speeches were great.” Asked if she was nervous at the podium, she said, “No, I wasn’t nervous. I’m a theater kid, you know.”

The judges awarded an Honorable Mention to Giana Yang, an international program student from China, living on campus during the week and staying with a host family in Katonah. In her speech, “Don’t Be Too Kind about Others’ Imperfections,” Giana advised people to be honest in their criticism of the performances of others and let me them know when they are not perfect. This way, she said, people will strive to perfect their performances.

Initiated at Harvey in 1958 by a first-year teacher of what was then an English-style boarding school for boys in grades one through eight, the speech contest today is a schoolwide project in which all students, boys and girls, in grades six through 12 write original persuasive essays and deliver them orally. The English teachers narrowed the field to 15 finalists who presented their speeches before the judges at the assembly of the entire school community of students and staff as well as members of the board of trustees and the parents of the contestants.

The other finalists were sixth-graders Zi Glucksman of Bedford Corners and Mia Cornell of Amawalk, seventh-grader Maelani Groff of Katonah, eighth-graders Zoe Lewis, Sanath Kumar and South Salem’s Elizabeth Mahony, ninth-graders Kylene Groff of Katonah and Pierce Steinberg, 10th-grader Aerin Glover, 11th-graders Jasmine Brouwer and Julia Slater of North Salem and senior Taylor Grodin of Amawalk.

The judges were Katherine Flannery Dering of Bedford, a published author, Lynn Harrington of Pound Ridge, former rector of St. John’s Episcopal Church in South Salem and Lisi Robinson of Bedford, a licensed clinical social worker who provides clinical support to inmates at Bedford Correctional Facility.

Photo 1: Emma Spada; Photo 2: From left, Giana Yang, Julia Chatzky and Spada; Photo 3: All the participants and judges. Photo credit: The Harvey School