‘Voyage of Adventure’:
Arkansas Beta conventions are finally underway in Spa City
The 15th annual Arkansas Elementary/Junior Beta Convention kicked off Monday at the Hot Springs Convention Center, with the 81st annual Senior Beta Convention starting today.
Originally scheduled for Jan. 17-19, the two conventions were rescheduled due to the inclement winter weather that affected much of the state.
“Given the circumstances on having to cancel the first one, because obviously, that would have been the priority, I think everything went very well,” State Beta Sponsor Heather Bradway said.
“We were able to get it rescheduled quickly. We didn’t have a ton of issues of people that weren’t able to go. There were going to be some conflicts, obviously, but it was as best as it could have been given the circumstances absolutely,” she said.
National Beta’s theme for 20232024 is “Beta: A Voyage of Adventure.”
Denia Brown, director of convention and leadership for the National Beta Club, said over 2,500 students had preregistered from the junior/senior division, along with approximately 76 clubs from across the state.
“You have a lot of students that compete in everything from visual arts to performing arts,” she said.
“We have musicology, quiz bowl, you have on-site drawing and painting, marketing and communications, all those things that allow students that seem to focus on the nonathletic side of students … we want to focus and cultivate the academic and visual art side of students.”
Junior Beta is divided into two divisions — elementary, which includes grades 4-5, and junior, which includes grades 6-8. Senior Beta covers grades 9-12.
Students had several meetings to start the day on Monday before transitioning into quiz bowls, onsite art competitions, spelling bees, and other activities.
The first general session was held at 3 p.m. inside Bank OZK Arena and featured a campaign rally, songfest finals, and an aca
demic awards presentation. Engineering and performing arts activities followed, along with work on the statewide service project, before the second general session kicked off at 7:30 p.m. in the arena.
The second general session featured the performing arts finals, top three awards presentation, and the individual introduction of candidates.
The elementary/junior portion of the annual conference ends this morning with the installation of new officers, a guest speaker, performing arts finals, and team and club awards presentations in the third general session.
The Senior Beta Convention, which goes through Wednesday afternoon, features much the same activities but on a higher scale. It includes classes and competitions in engineering, performing and visual arts, speech, robotics, and show choir.
The third general session, which will start Wednesday at 1 p.m., will see the installation of new officers, performing arts finals, and the awards presentation.
Brown said the difference in this year’s convention compared to last is that the number of competitions increased.
“This is the first year that we have quilling, which is one of the competitions that you use with paper, like a papier-mâché to create artwork. So that was one of the new competitions that was brought out this year. We are excited about that as well,” she said.
For both the junior and senior Betas, this year’s statewide service entails donating clothing to the needy.
“Our officers got together earlier in the fall and thought that they wanted to find some way to donate clothing items,” Bradway said. “So we partnered with the Arkansas Department of Human Services, and the clothing items, the socks and underwear, that we collect here today will go to the Department of Human Services in the state to be distributed statewide for children.”