A Paton-Churdan High School senior has achieved a milestone that not many Rockets have.

Phoenix Hartman has been performing in individual speech all four years of high school and in his senior year, he was selected to perform at the Iowa High School Speech Association All-State Speech Festival. His Prose entry is a monologue called, “Jeremy” by Don Zolidis and it is about a big, strong, confident man who wants to impress women so they will go out on dates with him. 

Hartman explains there are moments throughout the story where the crowd reacts and he talks about how he rushed those parts at the district contest, but when he slowed those down for state, it made for a more enjoyable show.

“Going slower, I think, kind of boosted my overall confidence. And during those like slow moments when people were laughing, it calmed me down. And I think that was important because going in my heart was pounding, I was sweating. You know, it was definitely scary. But after taking those slow moments to, you know, control my breathing, let the crowd do their thing, it helped me.”      

Hartman describes what it means for him to make it to the All-State Festival and his initial reaction when he found out he made it.

“I was just thinking that my name is going to be in the trophy case here at the school because there’s only been two others that have gone to All-State from Paton-Churdan, that’s an honor. So after I performed, I left immediately because I had other plans. And on the way, like I’m just thinking in my head, ‘Oh, what did I get, what did I get?’ And I found out and I was jumping as much as I could in the car. It was just so exciting.” 

Hartman will perform his Prose piece at the University of Northern Iowa this coming Monday.