Impromptu Weather Forecasting


Impromptu Weather Forecasting is a relatively new event, one that was developed and implemented into our competitions in the last two years. Basically, this event gives competitors the chance to try their hand at predicting the weather. The idea was hey, if professionals can incorrectly predict the weather, why not give these college kids a shot?  According to komonews.com, the best way to become a meteorologist is to take as many science and math-type related classes as you can such as Physics, Chemistry, and Trigonometry while in high school. Now since we're not in high school, and we only have three minutes to prep our speech, we're going to have to improvise. 

 Now I know what you're thinking, "How am I supposed to know what the weather's gonna be?" I'm so glad you asked! And isn't it crazy that I can predict your thoughts? I'm pretty good at forecasts. Anyway, when you walk into the room, you will be given a prompt that tells you the weather.  Well, sort of. Usually it's more like a politician- vague and pretty unhelpful. 

 For example, your prompt might say 
     High 90s all week with 85% humidity. Hurricane is headed straight for Florida

So what do we do with this? Good thing we have three minutes to prepare our four minutes speech. 

 Now before you walk into that room, you need to have a personality. If you don't have one, get one. You're going to be judged off of how engaging you are, how entertaining you are, your ability to correctly convey geographical locations, and how quick you are to improvise. Believe it or not, I have to tell people to know where the states are. There have been a few times where the competitor had no idea where the state they were talking about was on the map. When it comes to designing your personality we can have as much fun with this as you want. The bottom line is to connect with the judge. Crack jokes, make puns, do whatever you have to do to make transitions entertaining. 

 I opened with 
Good evening, and welcome to Chanel 7 News. Perfect number, perfect forecast. If it's not right for today, it'll be right a different night. 

 The forecast itself should consist of a 24 hour forecast and 7 day forecast that covers a broad region (six or seven major cities across the US plus the one you're competing in). We will need to look at temperature, precipitation, wind, etc. 
So now you need to think how that prompt would effect the rest of the US. It might be hot now, but the rain an winds from the Hurricane will bring in a cold front. How far will that reach across the US? Will the temp drop all over?  So now we can talk about how each of the regions will be affected. 

You also want a way to sign off. For example, I closed with
This has been Ryan Goke with Chanel 7 news. Perfect number, perfect forecast. I don't always get the  weather right but––wait yes I do, because it's my job. Thank you, and Goodnight!

 And there ya have it, you have just successfully signed off your first live television forecast. 

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