Cold Days, Warm Words: 2026 Pratt Packard Declamation Contest Finalists Shine

With snow piled to the sky and freezing winds whipping through the streets, students, staff, and faculty descended upon Colony Hall on a cold Tuesday morning. As members of the Choate community shed their winter coats, gloves, and hats, they were embraced with the warm, moving words of the 2026 Pratt Packard Declamation Contest finalists — Gopika Sheth ’27, Jinx Hartong ’27, Katherine Zhou ’27, and Esther Schonberger ’28. From Jinx's speech about living with Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome to Katherine's speech about choosing a life that feels authentic instead of one that only looks successful, students were dialed in as their peers poured their hearts and minds out on stage fearlessly. In the end, Gopika emerged as the 2026 Charles Krause Junior Fellow in Public Speaking after talking openly and honestly about how accents shape identity, belonging, and power, and how each word she shares on stage carries a piece of home and represents her family. 

"What I understand now is that accents do something almost impossible: they make time feel tangible," she said. "When my parents speak, I hear the streets of India they walked as children, the monsoon rains against rooftops, and the rhythm of Hindi and Gujarati mixing together at the dinner table. An accent is not a hindrance. It is a map of a life shaped across languages and experiences, carried forward rather than left behind."

Gopika, a fifth former from Hamden, Conn., not only shared her story with her fellow finalists and classmates but also learned a lot from them during this process. Listening to Katherine, Esther, and Jinx, she said, "I found myself not only learning more about them but also reflecting on and learning new things about myself."

"It was a deeply moving but vulnerable experience; opening up like that is hard when you’re standing in front of 800 people," she explained. "I just hoped that someone out there would feel seen or learn something new, and receiving so many beautiful messages afterward from people who truly related made everything worth it. In a sense, the speech felt like a personal dedication to my parents and my culture, and I'm incredibly grateful I was able to share that."

As finalists, Gopika, Katherine, Esther, and Jinx carry on the tradition of the Pratt Packard Declamation Contest. Led by John Cobb, the Pratt Packard Declamation contest honors two Choate teachers at the heart of Choate's long public speaking tradition — E. Stanley Pratt (a former Choate teacher of nearly 40 years) and H. Jeremy Packard, Choate 1955 (Former Head of the History Department). Mr. Packard, a former student of Mr. Pratt, revived the tradition at Choate when he helped reinstate public speaking as a requirement for all third formers in the late 1970s. Now, open to third, fourth, and fifth form students, the annual contest provides students with the opportunity to share their stories, thoughts, and ideas with their classmates in an exercise of community building, intellectual exchange, and empowerment.

Photo Credit: Joseph M. Avena is a Digital Content Producer at Choate Rosemary Hall, bringing expertise in content creation and community engagement.

Editorial Credit: Ryan Shepard '14 is the Manager of Editorial Services at Choate Rosemary Hall.