Speech and Debate dominates week three of Qualifiers, State students determined

The third and final weekend of Speech and Debate Qualifiers determined the students who are bound to the State tournament in representation of the Orange County Speech League (OCSL).

The March 5-6 tournament named winners in Individual Events (IEs) with 17 students placing. In Original Oratory, sophomore Rini Sampath placed 3^rd. First place in Original Advocacy went to senior Michael Lee, while sophomores Addie Pak, Arjun Ahuja and Q Chung placed 4^th, 6^th and 7^th, respectively. Senior Somaya Abdelgany placed 1^st in Dramatic Interpretation, while junior Tanya Abrahamian placed 6^th. Junior Natasha Karamally placed 7^th in Humorous Interpretation. Senior Victoria Nguyen placed 1^st in Original Interpretation, while seniors Jasmine Setoodeh and Michelle Ho placed 3^rd and 8^th, respectively. Impromptu winners included senior Akash Dixit, who placed 4^th, and Abdelgany, who scored a second win in 6^th. Dixit also won 5^th in National Extemporaneous speaking, while senior Sergei Radutnuy placed 7^th in International Extemporaneous speaking. Lastly, the Duo pair of Nguyen and senior Jessica Fong earned 3^rd place.

After three long weeks, the Qualifying tournaments have finally concluded. Northwood is taking 22 students to the State tournament, a first in the team’s history. The State tournament will occur from April 16 to 19 in Bakersfield.

“Northwood exceeded all of our expectations in terms of how many qualifiers we expected to bring,” said Speech and Debate president John Yu, a senior. “Historically, we never had such a high number of qualifiers. It shows that Northwood is not only growing but also improving. And we look forward to winning at State.”