Share:

A small town Louisiana girl can feel out of place within the hustle and bustle of Los Angeles’s many suburbs, like Pasadena. When Alicia Batice needs some time to settle, she’s unwinding in front of the Veteran’s Memorial Wall where the pine trees and the distant voices remind her of Franklinton, a small town she once called home.

“Louisiana’s quieter, but California’s so busy,” the communications major said. “Everyone’s on the go. Nobody has time to just take it in. I’m like, ‘Everything’s so beautiful!’ ‘You can see it tomorrow!’ ‘But it’s here right now!’ Nobody gets me.”

Having that much quiet can have an effect. Batice described herself as the shy kid with no voice, the bookworm who relates to Hermione Granger, the girl who absolutely refused to stand in front of a class and talk. So timid, in fact, that during her time at Southeastern Louisiana University, she failed her Intro to Public Speaking class, which put a damper on her usual straight-A records.

“I would get so nervous. I would miss all the presentation days,” Batice said. “I didn’t want to stand in front of people to talk. When I came here (to PCC), I said I have to get over this. So when I joined Speech 1, I was like, ‘we need this A. Let’s do it.’”

Of course, leave it to Pasadena City College to produce stellar students hidden away in kind and quiet types like Batice. The 25-year-old recently won first place in Persuasive Speaking at the PSCFA Spring Championships hosted at Moorpark. That triumph, however, came with another privilege: it enables her to compete in the Interstate Oratory National Persuasion Tournament as the representative for all of Southern California. It’s a huge honor, considering the fact that she’s the first PCC student to ever qualify.

“I’m trying not to let the pressure get to me,” Batice said. “I’m excited. I’ve never been to Georgia before, so this will be an experience.”

She’s already won 19 awards thus far in her two years on the forensics team, not including a video scholarship in which she bridges a medical relationship between guinea pigs and autistic children. Her topics, she says, have a lean toward health care, but she’s not afraid of making commentary about artwork.

“I lean more toward things that try to help the community and things that help bring awareness to society,” she said.

Additionally, she’s already been accepted to Northern Arizona University where she’ll pursue a degree in communications.

So how did the quiet girl become so good? For starters, it took a while for her to actually break out of her shell. After taking the introductory speech course, she enrolled in Speech 6, Fundamentals of Speech Communication and Speech 13, Argumentation and Debate, back to back under instructor Cindy Phu who then approached her.

“When Cindy approached me, I asked my brother if I should join the speech team. I knew it’d be a lot of work,” Batice said. “He said, ‘you should totally do it. Why won’t you do it? Is it because you’re scared? Get over that. Just do it.’”

When she won Spring Championships, she called her brother, who then mocked, “Should I join the speech team? Who was that a year ago?”

But it took some time for Batice to actually hone the craft of public speaking. On a technical level, a variety of things can affect the delivery of a speech. For example, if a speaker wasn’t fully invested in the topic, the delivery wouldn’t blow anybody away. Additionally, having no personality whatsoever can affect the performance. The key to testing the waters is just repetition.

“I work with each of my coaches for different pieces. They give me feedback,” Batice said. “I always find something different when I practice, so I’m always running them so that I don’t make them sound monotone.”

Her work follows her wherever she goes, Batice admits. She’s performed her own speeches in the shower and even when she’s trying to make time pass by.

“It’s especially weird at the bus stop because people are wondering why I’m talking to myself.”

Ask her sister Leticia what she thinks about her practices, and she laughs while rolling her eyes.

“Oh, it’s repetitive. She’ll be in the shower, talking. She’ll be walking around, talking. Outside, talking. It’s everyday. She even talks to her,” Leticia said, pointing at her 5-month-old daughter. “She sits and listens. I don’t know how, but it winds her down.”

For Batice, the biggest hurdle was amping up her own volume. Talk to Batice and you’ll find she’s articulate, fitting in little bursts of giggles through a soft-spoken demeanor. Her hands flow as she explains herself, almost as if she were conducting a band. Earlier on, however, coaches found that they needed her to get louder.

“I felt like I was yelling,” Batice said. “But I learned how to control my vocals and how to make my tones louder and lower. Now I know how to project. My voice can fill the room. I’m louder now, present, and have a bigger personality.”

Teaching seems to be embedded in her fiber. She plans on continuing forensics after she graduates by delving into speech and debate as an instructor at colleges. To Batice, if there’s an inkling of interest or intrigue, her mentality is to spread the good news.

“I love teaching people,” Batice said. “I’ve always been an informative speaker. I love teaching people. I love showing people new things. I love it when they get it. I’m like, ‘Yeah, that’s how easy it was.’”

“In my eight years of coaching, she is without a doubt, one of the most hard-working individual that I have ever had the pleasure to work with,” said speech instructor Cindy Phu. “Alicia has an obvious sense of purpose and her dedication to everything in her life is beyond words.”

When the devastating Hurricane Katrina struck her home state, leaving in its wake over 1,000 dead and a handful of flooded cities, Batice saw her small city suddenly transform.

“After Katrina, a lot of people relocated to our town. The new generation was coming in. We had to expand the schools to make room for everyone,” she said.

Franklinton, a retirement town, is small and quaint. But with the rise of displaced people flooding in, change was inevitable. Franklinton soon became a full-blown town.

Likewise, Batice is a little lady with a quiet disposition. But when change needed to be made, she rose to the occasion. She’s still a lady, of course, and she does have her library voice. But when she needs to get your attention, Batice can say it like she means it.

“Before I go on stage, I breathe. It’s helpful,” she said. “When you go up there, there’s a moment you take when you smile at everyone. And while I’m smiling, I say, ‘I hope you’re ready because I’m about to kill it.’”

Follow: