Deanna Alvarado wins Lions Club Student Speaker Contest

California City High School Senior, Deanna Alvarado successfully won the California Lions Club 4-L1 Zone B Region Student Speaker on March 2. Alvarado and two other contestants, Kylie Griffith from Ridgecrest and Austin Garrett from Tehachapi went head to head at the Robert P. Ulrich School. The topic this year is, "Freedom of the Press: What does it mean?"

Judges for the Zone competition were Velma Kinney, Brandi Robertson and Mary Wady all from California City. The speech was selected based on the strong presentation, enthusiasm, emphasis, voice control, enthusiasm, persuasiveness and the adherence to the topic to mention a few.

California City Host Lions Club President Jennifer Wood said she was impressed by the growth of Alvarado's presentation from the Club level. Wood said, "It is clear that Alvarado is honing and improving her speech. It is clear that she has put a lot of time into her presentation. We are proud that she is representing our club, California City High School and the City of California City."

Alvarado now moves to the Region competition on March 23 at the Holiday Inn at 38630 5th St. W. in Palmdale, Calif.

Contestants can win various amounts of scholarships along the way to the final contest if they progress through the levels of competition. For her win at this level, Alvarado won $250.

View more inspiring stories at http://www.md4lions.org. Lions Clubs International is the world's largest service club organization with more than 1.35 million members in 210 countries and geographical areas around the world. Since 1918, Lions clubs have aided the blind and visually impaired and made a strong commitment to community service and serving youth throughout the world.