Dear Speech and Debate families,
Welcome back to the Stuy Speech and Debate update! This month, our teams competed at the University of Pennsylvania’s 49th Liberty Bell Classic and the Harvard National Speech & Debate Tournament. Congratulations to all our members for their incredible performances!
At this point in the year, we also want to take a moment to express our gratitude to all the parents who have donated their time and resources to help our team thrive. Your support and generosity have been crucial to our success, and we could not have come this far without you. Thank you for all that you do.
As a reminder, you can find all of the team pictures, weekly updates, tournament schedules, permission slips/forms, and donation page on our website. Be sure to keep reading until the end of this post, as we have an important announcement to share.
Once again, we appreciate your continued support and look forward to updating you on our progress. Thank you for being a part of the Stuyvesant Speech & Debate family!
Team Updates
Lincoln Douglas:
Stuy LD had an amazing time at UPenn and Harvard!
At UPenn, senior Henry Ji and junior Daniel Zheng advanced to finals and CO-CHAMPIONED the tournament!! At Harvard, freshmen Evelyn Lifton, Kiren Sitwala, and Mufei Yu advanced to triple octo-finals, and senior Henry Ji advanced to partial quads. We're so proud of our team for all of their hard work and dedication, and are excited for the upcoming state championships and Grand Nationals!
Policy:
Policy excelled at UPenn & Harvard!
At UPenn, Richard Wang placed 8th speaker, Atiya Firooz placed 2nd speaker, and Salioudian Barry placed 1st speaker. Congratulations to the team for performing well!
At Harvard, after months of intense research and preparation, our team SWEPT in both the novice and JV division. In novice, every single Stuyvesant team advanced to the elimination rounds! Congrats to Seoyeon Yu and Ken Wakida, as well as Serenity Dingwall and Ginwan Elfaki, for advancing to the octofinals! We are also extremely proud of Valerie Pook and Amy Shrestha, who made it to quarterfinals in Novice Policy. And a shout out to Ginwan Elfaki for being 14th speaker! In the JV Division, Amrit Das and Aruna Vaithilingam came in 2ND place, making them Harvard Finalists! They also received 3th and 5th place speaker respectively. Harvard is one of the most competitive national tournaments policy debate and we are incredibly proud of everyone on the team. A huge thank you to Ms. Sheinman for making this trip possible, and our judges Manny, Vikram, Ibrahima, and Zara!
Extemp:
At UPenn, all of the extempers who attended the University of Pennsylvania Invitational made it to elimination rounds: Aleksey Olkhovenko (4th), Eshaal Ubaid (6th), Kai Li (Semis), and Myles Vuong (Quarters)! At Harvard, captain and senior Eshaal Ubaid and Kai Li advanced to quarterfinals and senior Aleksey Olkhovenko advanced to octofinals! For all seven competing, we all saw immense growth from last year and were able to leave one of the last overnight tournaments with long lasting memories.
Congress:
Stuy Congress excelled at The Liberty Bell Classic at UPenn! We are so proud of every single team member. Juniors Jia Lin and Daniel Prizant and seniors William Tang and Olivia Woo advanced to the semi-finals! Congress also had an extremely fun and informative time at Harvard! We are extremely proud of senior William Tang and sophomore Raymond Chen for advancing to the quarter-finals amid very tough competition. After a relaxing break, the team looks forward to competing at regionals in March!
Public Forum:
PF had an amazing time at UPenn! Congrats to Brandon Tung & Annie Li and Helen Mancini & Astrid Harrington for advancing to double octofinals, and Helen and Astrid for receiving 8th and 12th place speakers respectively! At Harvard, freshmen Adrien Devery-Michaelson and Ethan Zheng advanced to novice quarterfinals, and Lander Bovenzi and Nara Kong also advanced into the elimination rounds. In JV PF, congrats to Eric Liu and Benjamin Yarden for placing 4th and 12th speakers respectively. In Varsity PF, congrats to Brandon Tung and Annie Li, Amrisha Roy and Kikyo Makino-Siller, and Astrid Harrington and Helen Mancini for advancing to elimination rounds.
Speech:
Speech went to UPenn and Harvard!
UPenn was the first invitational for some of our members, and a huge congratulations to those who competed. Eli Lifton placed 4th in Original Oratory, and Audrey Hilger and Ethan Khosh placed 3rd and 5th in Humorous Interpretation respectively. At Harvard, Eli Lifton was an octofinalist in Original Oratory, and everyone had a great time!
Parliamentary:
The team is getting ready for the upcoming March In-Person Invitational with a lesson on speaking style and a lecture on International relations from our coach Rodda!
Grands Announcement
Dear Speech and Debate families,
We are excited to announce that Stuyvesant will be hosting the NYCFL Grands Qualifier on March 16th, 2024. This tournament is the qualifying tournament for the NCFL Grand National Tournament in Chicago, IL on Memorial Day weekend. The results of this tournament determine which speakers and debaters will represent our local league at the national level.
Hosting this tournament is an incredible honor for us. Last year, we had over 200 competitors attend. Over 100 team members and parents provided the incredible hospitality and international food feast, about which everyone was raving. The tournament would not have been such a resounding success without everyone’s support.
To ensure a command performance this year, we need everyone’s help in providing food and beverages for our guests. Please fill out the form below if you can contribute to this effort in any way.
Thank you,
Stuyvesant Speech and Debate Team
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If you have any questions or would like to provide feedback, don't hesitate to reach out to us by responding to this email or contacting stuy4n6@gmail.com. We will get back to you as soon as possible.
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