IESA Headlines

2020 Fine Art Award Winners: Beth Sadler, Brandy McQuen, and Roger Green

The recipients who earned the Fine Art recognition awards -- the Distinguished Service Award and the Class Act Award -- are teacher-coaches who have set the bar high.

Given for the first time during the 2009-10 school year, the criteria for the two awards is similar. The recipients must be actively involved in IESA Speech. The recipients must demonstrate the ability to develop and promote standards of good performance practices, integrity and life skills within their students. The contributions of both award winners must have positively impacted students and the school community.

For the Distinguished Service Award winner, the contributions must be significant and/or long term for someone involved with Speech for over eight years of coaching. For the Class Act Award winner, the contributions are from someone involved with Speech for at least 3 and not more than 8 years of coaching.

Beth Sadler who has coached the speech team for over 30 years at Bradley West Elementary School is the 2020 Distinguished Service Award winner. Beth has always put her whole heart into coaching. She has cultivated a program that has focused on her 5th grade participants. Her dedication to this age group has seen her students' continued participation throughout their junior high and high school careers. Beth encourages her students to participate in as many performances as possible by setting up multiple opportunities in her school and community to showcase their hard work. She has also served the activity as a judge for the past 25 years, continuing to nurture students’ passion and interest in performance. Her dedication and leadership will be dearly missed with her retirement.

Brandy McQuen, the coach at Rutland Grade School in Ottawa for the past five years, is the 2020 Class Act Award winner. Brandy started the speech program in her small school to give students an introduction to performance. She is a true advocate for the activity and believes that speech fosters confidence in students, builds camaraderie among team members and promotes a strong work ethic. Brandy is an active recruiter for the activity within her school and has a knack for guiding those that have joined her troupe to events where they have performed successfully.

The Ken Bradbury Lifetime Service award is presented to individuals in the Speech community who have given considerable time and talent to the activity.

This year the Ken Bradbury Award is being presented to Roger Green. Roger has been a staunch supporter of IESA Speech for over 40 years. He was a part of the early Speech Advisory Committee that shaped and launched the activity. Roger has served as a coach, member of the Speech advisory committee for 17 years, workshop presenter, and loyal advocate for the students/coaches/and activity. His work as a judge and judge representative has set the standard for performance evaluation. IESA is, and continues, to be one of the finest programs offered because of the active support of individuals like Roger Green.

Congratulations to Beth Sadler, Brandy McQuen, and Roger Green.