B. Novice Impromptu Event Prompts

Round 1 (9:30am)

  1. Speaker 1


    Speaker 1

    1. "To err is human; to forgive, divine" — Alexander Pope

    2. "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold" — W. B. Yeats

    3. "Because I could not stop for death/He kindly stopped for me" — Emily Dickinson

  2. Speaker 2


    Speaker 2

    1. "I am the master of my fate" — William Ernest Henley

    2. "Tis better to have loved and lost/Than never to have loved at all" —Tennyson

    3. "My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun" — Shakespeare"

  3. Speaker 3


    Speaker 3

    1. "The child is father of the man"  — Woodsworth

    2. "Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair" — Shelley

    3. "Candy/Is dandy/But liquor/Is quicker" — Ogden Nash

  4. Speaker 4


    Speaker 4

    1. "I wandered lonely as a cloud" — Woodsworth
    2. "But at my back I always hear" — Marvell

    3. "Beauty is truth, truth beauty; that is all"— Keats

  5. Speaker 5


    Speaker 5

    1. "And miles to go before I sleep" — Robert Frost

    2. "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield" — Tennyson

    3. " A little learning is a dangerous thing" — Alexander Pope

  6. Speaker 6


    Speaker 6

    1. "Not with a bang but a whimper" — T. S. Elliot

    2. "The proper study of mankind is man" — Alexander Pope

    3. "Tread softly because you tread on my dreams" — W. B. Yeats

  7. Speaker 7


    Speaker 7

    1. "To be or not to be: that is the question" — Shakespeare

    2. “Hope springs eternal in the human breast” — Alexander Pope

    3. “I think that I shall never see/A poem lovely as a tree.” — Joyce Kilmer

Round 2 (1:15pm)

  1. Speaker 1


    Speaker 1

    “... Men are only decent when they are powerless.” — George Orwell

    “There are no facts, only interpretations.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “We forfeit three-fourths of ourselves in order to be like other people.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

  2. Speaker 2


    Speaker 2

    “Perhaps a man really dies when his brain stops, when he loses the power to take in a new idea.” — George Orwell

    “He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.”  — Arthur Schopenhauer

  3. Speaker 3


    Speaker 3

    “If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” — George Orwell

    “No victor believes in chance.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Every nation criticizes every other one — and they are all correct.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

  4. Speaker 4


    Speaker 4

    “There is something wrong with a regime that requires a pyramid of corpses every few years.” — George Orwell

    “What does not kill me, makes me stronger.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Life is a business that does not cover the costs.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

  5. Speaker 5


    Speaker 5

    “Either we all live in a decent world, or nobody does.” — George Orwell

    “Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Every child is in a way a genius; and every genius is in a way a child.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

  6. Speaker 6


    Speaker 6

    “There are occasions when it pays better to fight and be beaten than not to fight at all.” — George Orwell

    “Most men are too concerned with themselves to be malicious.” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

  7. Speaker 7


    Speaker 7

    “Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent.” — George Orwell

    “He who has a ‘Why?’ in life can tolerate almost any ‘How?’” — Friedrich Nietzsche

    “Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

Finals (4:15pm)

  1. Speaker 1


    Speaker 1

    1. It is estimated that 99% of all species that have ever lived on Earth are now extinct. — New York Times, 2014

    2. 60% of people can’t get through a ten-minute conversation without lying. — University of Massachusetts, 2002

    3. 2% of American voters thought Mitt Romney’s first name was Mittens. — Vanity Fair, 2012

  2. Speaker 2


    Speaker 2

    1. Only 8% of people manage to keep their New Year’s resolutions. — Statistic Brain Research Institute, 2012

    2. Between 43% and 54% of pilots have admitted to falling asleep while flying.— European Cockpit Association, 2012

    3. 15% of Google searches have never been searched before. — John Wiley, the lead designer for Google Search, 2013

  3. Speaker 3


    Speaker 3

    1. 20% of the songs on Spotify have received zero plays.

     — Forgotify, 2014

    1. 28% of people who work in IT don’t tell their family and friends for fear of being asked for help fixing computers. 

    TEKsystems, 2013

    1. 70% of youth in the juvenile justice system have a diagnosed mental illness.

    The National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice, 2007

  4. Speaker 4


    Speaker 4

    1. 1 in 3 adults don’t get enough sleep.

    Center for Disease Control and Prevention, 2016

    1. The world needs to produce at least 50% more food by 2050 to feed a projected 9 billion people.

    United Nations Population Division, 2015

    1. Only 18% of women major in computer science degrees at colleges and universities.

    National Science Foundation, 2015

  5. Speaker 5


    Speaker 5

    1. 60% of nursing home residents never have visitors.

    VolunteerGuide, 2013

    1. 75% of Gen Z-ers don’t consider college the only path to a strong education.

    Forbes, 2019

    1. 46% of American adults will experience a mental illness during their lifetime.

    — National Council for Behavioral Health, 2019

  6. Speaker 6


    Speaker 6

    1. 84% of Americans say we are angrier than a generation ago. — NPR-IBM Watson Health Poll, 2019

    2. Fewer than 2% of NCAA athletes go on to the professional level. — NCAA, 2018

    3. One-third of adults still sleep with a comfort object. — Sleepopolis, 2019

     

  7. Speaker 7


    Speaker 7

    1. As many as 95% of millennials are "not saving adequately" for retirement.

    National Institute on Retirement Security, 2018

    1. 40% of Americans can’t name a single freedom protected by the First Amendment. 

    Freedom Forum Institute, 2018

    1. Five countries make up 60% of worldwide military. 

    Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, 2018