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Speech and Debate has expanded their skills in new ways this season, and has shown it at both the region and state competition. At region they placed third as a team, and at state they were in a three way tie for fourth.
At region junior Sage Ivory took second in Interps, sophomore Wyatt Bills and junior Ethan Mendicino placed third and fourth in Foreign Extemp, senior Taylor Timms and junior Katie Jones both took third in Impromptu, junior Lily Mitchell placed 10th in Informative, senior Merric Anderson took ninth in National Extemp, and sophomore Hannah Holbrook placed sixth in Oratory.
In Debate events: Timms and junior Quincy Benson both placed second in Public Forum, senior Jackson Hightower and Anderson both take fourth in Policy, Bills and Jones place second and ninth in Congress, Holbrook takes 10th in Lincoln Douglas
At state, Bills took third in Congress and Mitchell took fifth in Informative.
Speech and Debate coach Alex Bailey is proud with region results.
“I think we have a difficult and competitive region,” Bailey said. “We go up against tough schools from all over, so placing third at region is something to be proud of.”
Regional competitions play a special role in preparing students for upcoming state tournaments.
“The most important thing for state is going to region,” Bailey said. “We use a lot of the same topics from region that we use for state, so getting research prepared, and coming back from region with judges feedback helps us a bunch for state.”
Getting ready for state takes often even more extensive effort and significant amounts of time.
“Preparation for Speech and Debate cases is about compiling evidence, writing arguments, talking with teammates, and formulating arguments,” Anderson said. “It can take anywhere from 10, 20, 40 hours.”
Despite the chaos at the competition, Mitchell persevered.
“At first I had given up that I would do well,” Mitchell said. “After I came out of my first round I was like, ‘That actually went really well’ so I just had fun with it.”
Speech and Debate can be a nerve wracking club to apply effort into, but the students at NS gave it their all this year.
“I think it’s strange,” Anderson said. “It’s definitely gotten easier to go and perform, but before your debate round you still feel the shivers, nervousness, and butterflies in your stomach. I don’t think it ever goes away, but I like to remind myself from my past competition performance that I compete at a higher level than before. That always helps a lot.”
Bailey is impressed by the team’s season.
“I think we’ve done the best this year,” Bailey said, “in terms of having more people joining the team, but also how they’ve placed. Most kids placed in the top 10 in most of their competitions.”
