On October 10th 2020, Asian Law Students’ Association Universitas Indonesia, also referred to as ALSA UI, held its annual competition. The ALSA E-Comp is consisted of different competition branches: newscasting, spelling bee, speech, debate, and storytelling, each divided to high school level and varsity level.
The competition starts with a preliminary round, where 40 participants are required to submit a 5-7-minute speech video according to the given topic to YouTube. The number of participants will be reduced to 15 in the semi-final round, which is a live round where participants are required to write and deliver a speech of the given topic within one hour of preparation time. 5 participants will continue to grand final round.
Samantha Deo Christian, International Relations Batch 2019, was was sent by the IULI English Club (IEC) to join this competition. She has successfully won third place in the competition and has made us all proud. “ALSA UI definitely intimidated me at first. The competition was tough–everyone was good and I can tell, experienced. Even the preliminary topics were tough. I had to go through 10-15 video takes just to produce 1 video that I really like– and thankfully I got through the prelims with it”, Samantha explained.
“The semifinals went smoothly, though! I think it was also my favourite speech that I have ever delivered, and i took me to the grand finals round–which was crazy nerve wrecking and I had to text 2 different seniors just to have them calm me down”, she added.
ALSA UI really pushed Samantha as a speaker to work hard. From script writing to styles of speech, everything was put to the test. It was a wonderful experience that really sharpened her skills. “I am very thankful to the IEC who has trusted, supported, and guided me along the way. If it weren’t for them, I wouldn’t be here”.