Forensics is one of the only activities that allow competitors to speak passionately without being interrupted; which is exactly what attracted Quinn Mckenzie to the club. When McKenzie attended his first team meeting, he fell in love with the strategy, skill and time management involved in competition. Since joining forensics in college, he has worked on helping students improve in speech and debate. Mckenzie comes to Trinity as a forensics coach and ninth grade honors world history teacher.
McKenzie was born in Durham, North Carolina before moving to the suburbs of Chicago at age 11. Growing up, he enjoyed playing basketball, board games and computer strategy games, along with his undeterred love for school and learning new things. In both high school and college, McKenzie tutored other students in a variety of subjects, including history, government and math.
After high school, McKenzie went on to undergraduate school at Butler University, where he found his passion for forensics. Throughout his time on the forensics team, he competed in every event available to him. McKenzie especially enjoyed debate, as it provided an opportunity to compete against other people, test strategies and work under pressure.
“I think debate really appealed for me because it is so much a strategy game,” McKenzie said. “It’s not just having the right evidence, but knowing how to use it. It’s being able to see your opponent’s strategy for what it is and counter and respond to it in time. It was like a time crunch. So for me, someone that really enjoys that sort of mental challenge, I loved competing in debate.”
After receiving his bachelor’s degree in political science, history and German literature, McKenzie went on to finish his graduate studies at Marshall University, where he earned a degree in history. Following college, McKenzie taught at the high school level for two and a half years, teaching U.S. government, German and U.S. history. Afterwards, he returned to Marshall and taught introduction to public speaking for two and a half years. Throughout that time, McKenzie served as a forensics coach and independent mentor. Along with forensics, McKenzie has always found the study of history to be interesting, and enjoys teaching it to students.
“I love history,” McKenzie said. “I find it so fascinating to imagine what it was like to live the lives of people in the past and the society they functioned in. As a thought exercise, it is so cool to put yourself into the shoes of people in a different world at a different time, and to sort of reconstruct rhetorically and conceptually.”
Away from the classroom, McKenzie loves playing and watching sports, including curling. He likes watching baseball and college basketball, especially his alma mater Butler. When March comes along, McKenzie sometimes watches March Madness games while grading papers. In his first year at Trinity, McKenzie hopes to pass on his passion for learning with his students.
“I really love learning new information, it excites me,” McKenzie said. “And I want to share that with other people. I want other people to be even a fraction of as excited to learn as I am. And I hope I can convey that.”
