JEFF FIELDER Editor
SIDNEY – Julia Siqueira, a senior at Sidney High School, is Nspire Today!’s Female Student of the Month for January. She has a 3.97 grade-point average and is involved in National Honor Society. Other school activities she’s involved in are Unified Raider Peer Tutoring (co-student director), Community Emergency Response Team, One Acts (assistant director), mentoring at West Elementary School in Sidney, and speech. Her sophomore year, she earned a NSAA Academic All-State award. After graduating from high school, Julia plans to attend college and major in either communications or political science. She’s considering Davidson College in North Carolina as well as a couple colleges in Nebraska. Her mom is Marcia Kottwitz and her stepdad is Randy Kottwitz.
Q: How has your senior year been going?
SIQUEIRA: “It’s been going pretty well. Being back in school is refreshing to me. Last year I was involved in a different school program due to COVID and risk factors, so it’s nice to get back into the groove of a traditional school day and participate in school activities again.”
Q: You’re involved in quite a few activities at school. Which one do you enjoy the most?
SIQUEIRA: “Speech. I’m an extemporaneous speaker. I like that one because you don’t really have much time to prepare for your speech. You draw a topic, and then you have about an hour to do research on that topic.”
Q: Does not having much time to prepare for your speech make you a little nervous?
SIQUEIRA: “No, not really. Since you can’t control what your topic will be or how much time you’ll have to prepare for your speech, there’s no point in being anxious. Everyone is in the same situation. You just do what you can with your topic. If you perform well, the feeling you get when you’re done is amazing.”
You can read the entire story in the January 2022 issue of Nspire Today! magazine. A one-year subscription (12 issues) is only $20. You may sign up for a subscription by sending $20 to Nspire Today!, P.O. Box 454, Scottsbluff, NE 69363, or you may pay with a credit card by calling 308-220-8865.
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