Warren E. Wright Prize

This prize was established in honor of Warren E. Wright, the Upson Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Hamilton from 1977 to 1993 upon Wright’s retirement from Hamilton College. The prize was first awarded in 1993.

In 2025, this prestigious award is worth $10,000 and the winner will be recognized at Class and Charter Day.

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Eligibility

The Wright Prize is open to all full-time students who have successfully completed the public speaking course Genres of Oral Communication. In order to have a competition, there must be at least four contestants for the preliminary round. 

Requirements

This competition requires an informative speech rather than a persuasive speech. That is, the purpose of the speech should be to enlighten rather than to advocate. The topic should have relevance and interest for a Hamilton College audience and should be presented in a manner appropriate for the occasion and setting.

Preliminary Round

To participate in the 2025 Preliminary Round, you must record your speech at the OCC during one of our dedicated recording times. Times will be available between Thursday, February 13 and Monday, February 17, and can be reserved in TracCloud.

You will only have one opportunity to record your speech. You may restart once if you make a major mistake less than one minute in, but you may not come back to re-record.

Final Round

Following the presentation of the speech, each competitor is asked no more than two questions. Competitors have up to two minutes to respond to each question. Judging includes an evaluation of the poise with which a finalist handles the questions as well as the organization and content of those responses.

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Scoring

The judges will assign scores on two broad areas: content/organization and delivery. Judges will also score each entry on overall engagement and informativeness.

Final round scores are separate from preliminary round scores, but are scored on the same criteria. Questions from judges are only asked during the final round and are not part of preliminary round scoring.

Content

• Speaker made a clear case for why a Hamilton community member should listen to this speech.
• Language use was accessible to the listener.
• Speaker used evidence that supported the main point of the speech.
• A listener could easily follow the organization of the content.

Delivery

• Speaker’s use of vocal delivery (volume, pitch, emphasis) enhanced the message.
• Nonverbal delivery (gestures and eye contact) enhanced the message.
• Speaker's delivery was conversational rather than rotely memorized or read.

Overall Impression

• The speaker was informative, that is, provided the listener with clear information about a topic without trying to persuade them to agree or take action.
• The speaker was engaging to watch.
• The speaker was poised in responding to questions.
• The speaker's responses addressed the questions coherently.

Scoring Notes

In the event of a tie, overall engagement and persuasiveness will be used to determine the winner.

For the final round, speakers will be shown a countdown of their remaining time. The minimum time is 6 minutes and maximum time is 8 minutes. If speeches run shorter than the minimum or longer than the maximum, they will incur a 5% point penalty after a ten second grace period. Answers to the required questions from the judges do not count toward the total time of the speech.

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Recent winners

2024

Eric Moss '24, "Nature=Nurture: The Benefits of Spending Time Outdoors" | video

2023

Tinashe Manguwa '25, "A Collision With Decision" | video

2022

Abbie Wolff '22, "Reimagining Time and Space with Walkable Communities" | video

2021

Jay Menner '21, "Who Was Alexander Hamilton?" | video

2020

Taomi Kenny ’20, "Ego Depletion: When Willpower is Powerless!" | video