Speech and Debate team sweeps competition at UT Austin

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After a competitive weekend, the speech and debate team took home second place at the Longhorn Classic Tournament held at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin). Students traveled to Texas  Dec. 2-5, to compete in their specific event, facing over 1,200 other high school students from 108 schools. 

Aside from earning second place overall, 23 students took home individual awards. 

Triple Octofinalists:

  • Evan Burkeen, 12
  • Matthew Rodriguez, 10

Quarterfinalists:

  • Saanya Dham, 10
  • Carly Aikens, 12
  • Anagha Iyer, 9
  • Hank Nathanson, 9
  • Veer Roy, 10
  • Spencer Swickle, 11
  • Laura Marberger and Jade Capella, 9

Semifinalists:

  • Shreyan Singha, 10
  • World Schools Team
    • Jake Zeng, 10
    • Taeyoung Kim, 11
    • Charlotte Wu, 11
    • Rosa Wu, 12
    • Asha Patra, 12 

Finalists:

  • 2nd Place: Jaimee Canalejo, 9
  • 4th place: Jade Capella, 9

Champions: 

  • Kennedy Hack-Juman, 10
  • Esther Oyetunji, 10 
  • Mason Cheng and Ethan Roytman, 11
The Worlds Schools debate team, which competes in the World Schools event, is pictured here before and after the competition. World Schools debate is a 3 versus 3 debate on the international scale using logic. The team made it all the way to semifinals. (Photo/Rosa Wu)

Speech students junior Kennedy Hack-Juman and sophomore Jaimee Canalejo practice performing their pieces before the final round. Freshman Jade Capella finishes her informative speech in her final round. (Photos/Joele Denis)

The entire team poses outside the University of Texas at Austin with their newly awarded medals and certificates. (Photos/Joele Denis)

The team shows their love for Austin and each other by posing in front of the iconic aesthetic Austin ‘I Love You’ sign. (Photo/Joele Denis)

As a rising senior, this is Emma’s third year in the Patriot Post and she’s excited to be the Online Editor this year. Outside of newspaper, she’s Co-President of the journalism honor society, Quill and Scroll, and also the Editor-in-Chief of the Sigma Xi Honor Society magazine. She is also involved in and has officer positions in Science Research, Sigma Xi, FBLA, Model UN, SNHS, and other clubs, including honor societies and her own nonprofit. In her free time, she enjoys reading, watching dramas on Netflix, listening to Taylor Swift, and hanging out with friends and family. She’s very excited to work on the Patriot Post this year!