Arlington Hts. girl, 12, youngest national debate winner

At the tender age of 12, Erin McDermott of Arlington Heights already has a national title under her belt.

At the National Speech and Debate Association tournament held last month in Dallas, Erin emerged the champion in the declamation event, competing against nearly 120 middle school students from across the country.

The competition drew 5,000 students in all and of those, 1,000 were middle schoolers who vied in 15 speech and debate events.

In the declamation event, students select a speech that already was delivered by someone else. Many of those recited at this year's nationals were TED talks, but Erin chose a more obscure speech.

She delivered a speech originally given by former magician Richard Spiegel, called "Even the Crumbled Ones."

"I chose it because it talks about the beauty and magic in life," Erin says. "It's there, but you just have to believe."

She delivered the speech successfully through five preliminary rounds before advancing through the quarterfinals and semifinals and ultimately to the finals, where she was a unanimous first-place pick by all six judges. She was the youngest national winner.

"I liked the challenge in it," Erin says. "You really have to dig down and find the passion in the speech, to be able make an impact on the audience - and the judges."

Erin will be a seventh-grader this fall at South Middle School in Arlington Heights. She is the third in her family to win a national championship as a middle school student.

Her older siblings, Jimmy and Molly McDermott now compete for Prospect High School, where they continue to excel. They helped Prospect's speech team be recognized this past season as one of two schools in the state that are in the top 50 in the nation.

Individually, Jimmy, who will be a junior, also tied for eighth place in his event last month, which was the highest finish nationally by a Prospect student.

Erin and her brother and sister come by their interest in speech naturally. Their father, Scott McDermott, is an associate principal at Prospect, where he helps to coach the speech team.

Together with his 16 years at Glenbrook South High School, he has coached speech for nearly 25 years. Getting his own children interested in the activity, he says, was a natural.

"Public speaking just opens doors," McDermott says. "What a skill to have. More often than not, the kids that can do it are better off. They'll be successful no matter what they do.

"It's one of the things college admissions counselors tell us all the time," he adds, "that kids need to be able to communicate, to carry on a conversation."

Erin and her siblings grew up in Mount Prospect before the family moved earlier this month to Arlington Heights. The children attended Lincoln Junior High School in Mount Prospect Elementary District 57, which had no speech program.

Consequently, they all competed at nationals as individuals.

"I look at it as an opportunity that no one else at my school gets," says Erin, who also competes in track, does Irish step dancing with the Dylan Gavin School of Irish Dance in Des Plaines, and just finished volunteering at vacation Bible school at her church.

Still, with all of her accomplishments, her real passion is working magic in the kitchen.

"I love to cook," Erin says. "I want to be a chef some day."