Speech is a pathway to self-expression and communication for Jaila Mabry, a recent graduate from Eisenhower High School in Blue Island.
She came in fourth in the nation in expository speaking at the National Speech and Debate Association championship in Phoenix and has garnered other wins for her speaking prowess since she was a sophomore.
All her hard work and talent has also paved the way to Harvard University with some generous scholarships.
But Mabry said she also just gets a boost from public speaking.
“I was hooked,” said Mabry about the day during her sophomore year when Mark Urban, head coach, speech and English teacher, talked to students about auditioning. “He pitched it as something that would give you so many different life skills you could use … that really caught my attention.
“Not just practicing speaking but writing, even acting,” said Mabry.
She won both the regional and sectional championships in Radio Speaking and Impromptu Speaking, helping her school nab its first IHSA Regional championship this spring.
Urban wasn’t surprised.
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“Like always, I just think she was extremely prepared and she was poised and confident,” said Urban. “She’s not easily intimidated by competition, either.
“She’s always been aboveboard, intuitive and has always had a quest for learning,” he said.
Bill Fleming, a speech assistant coach who had worked Mabry since her sophomore year, said she had a strong work ethic and talent to begin with that grew through her practice with different coaches on various competitions.
“She’s always been a go-getter,” said Fleming. “The fact that she’s going to Harvard is testament to the amount of work she puts into whatever it is she wants.”
Fleming said Mabry has a unique sense of humor, rather than merely copying other people’s, and is able to speak concisely and to the point. When she competed in expository speaking she spoke on “brain freeze” and how to stop it, exploring the topic in five minutes.
“It’s a speech that had to be crafted well and delivered well,” he said.
The radio competition in the spring also required a limited amount of preparation time.
“The speech will be different every time you perform it, which makes it more fun,” Mabry said. “Plus the whole point was to be like a radio broadcast, you had a chance to develop a radio voice, which is almost like a character that sounds like a news anchor.”
Mabry said she worked hard, but also credits her coaches and parents for her success.
“I wouldn’t have been able to be as familiar and well acquainted with my speeches,” she said. “I created the foundation so when I wrote a speech, I wrote the speech and memorized and performed it, but my coaches went in and made the writing a little bit better and gave me all the tools and tips to bring the performance to perfection.”
She said her parents’ support and hard work helped put her where she is. Her dad works for the U.S. Postal Service and her mom for Southwest Airlines, after a career with UPS and owning her own business.
“The biggest thing my parents have done for me is given me endless support,” Mabry said. “I am a first-generation college student, but my parents have made a life for me where there’s nothing I could ask for that I don’t already have.”
Mabry was also in marching band, a vice president for the National Honor Society and a member of the Environmental Club, Leo Club and Book Club. She said she loved English, as well as chemistry and U.S. government.
She’s already started the summer rising scholars program at Harvard and plans a double major in government and history, and literature.
Janice Neumann is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.