McClintock Speech and Debate Nationally Honored

McClintock+Speech+and+Debate+Nationally+Honored

Makoto Hunter

McClintock’s Speech and Debate team placed nationally in both individual events and team sweepstakes at the June 2015 National Speech and Debate Association Tournament in Dallas, Texas.

Every year, the National Speech and Debate Association, or NSDA, hosts a national tournament for members of the association across the nation to compete in on a national level. Four McClintock students – graduated senior Fargo Tbakhi, senior Roman Shemakov, junior Emily Wescott, and junior Erin Granillo-Walker – qualified to attend the 2015 NSDA Tournament held this year in Dallas, Texas.

“McClintock did well individually and as a team,” McClintock Speech and Debate’s head coach Tim Cornwell said. “Individually, Fargo took fifth in Dramatic Interpretation. Roman was a semi-finalist and took eleventh in International Extemporaneous Speaking.”

Not only did individual members of the McClintock Speech and Debate team receive awards, but the team as a whole was also honored.

“Taking team points just off of those two speech entries, the McClintock Team earned the Excellence in Speech Award, which is given to the top twenty point-getters for teams out of the approximately one thousand schools entered, which is the best we’ve ever done,” Cornwell said.

Before going to the national tournament, however, students must qualify to attend and compete.

“Each district has a qualifying tournament at the end of the year, and if you place in the top three at that tournament, you qualify to attend Nationals. I won my event, and qualified to go,” recent McClintock graduate, former McClintock Speech and Debate Team President, and two-time national tournament qualifier Fargo Tbakhi said.

Because competitors must first place in their local qualifying tournaments to attend and compete in the NSDA Tournament, competition at the tournament is at a tremendously high level, pushing all those competing to hone their skills and become the best they can be.

“The tournament was huge! Some of the best schools from across the entire nation just decided to gather up in one big place, and if that’s not the scariest thing in the world, I don’t know what is,” Current Speech and Debate Team co-President Roman Shemakov said.

Thousands of students from across the nation competed in the NSDA Tournament in Dallas, Texas in the span of five short days (June 14th – June 19th). Placing in any event requires scoring better in one’s rounds than thousands of other students, all of whom were skilled enough to place in their own local district qualifier tournaments.

Speech and Debate is a competitive high school activity wherein school teams compete at weekend tournaments in various events, running the gamut of public speaking, debate, and even acting. Fargo Tbakhi competed in the acting event of Dramatic Interpretation, Roman Shemakov competed in the public speaking event of International Extemporaneous Speaking, and Emily Wescott and Erin Granillo-Walker competed together in the team debate event of Policy, or Cross-Examination.

“Speech and Debate is an activity that not only allows students to express themselves, their intelligence, and their talent, it also is an activity that creates leaders,” Cornwell said. “Tomorrow’s leaders. And [it] is quite effective in making well-rounded young men and young women.”

Those interested in joining the team are encouraged to attend the first meeting after school on Thursday, August 20th, 2015 at 5:00 PM in room 829, the Drama Room.