Riley Freese

Members of the debate team pose with their awards.

Summer is rapidly approaching. With this comes the promise of relaxation and a break from the stress that accompanies school. Most students will have phrases including: “going to the beach” and “leaving for vacation” written on their calendar, for some they will have to replace these common phrases with “super stressful and elite debate tournament.”

The National Speech and Debate Association’s National Debate Tournament will take place June 14-19 in Dallas, Texas. It is one of the most exclusive debate events of the year, the students inducted into this competition have gone through multiple tournaments beforehand in order to reach this level.

“At the qualifying tournament we went through a process of preliminary rounds,” communications junior Emma Harris said. “In these preliminary rounds, if you were in the top half, in the round, you got what [is] called an ‘up’ and if you were in the bottom half you got a ‘down, once the fourth preliminary round was over, we went to finals. The next day, everyone found out whether or not they qualified.”

Due to the abundance of preliminary rounds and competitions, this tournament is specifically more difficult to get into, as it only takes two students per debate event. Communications dean Angela Weber is the coach of Dreyfoos’ speech and debate team and has overseen these students progress as they prepared for the rigorous tournament.

“It is one of the most difficult [tournaments] for students to get into. It certainly puts [the competitors] on a national landscape. It helps them gain recognition, and even if they did not get in, just competing in [these competitions] is a learning experience for them.” Mrs. Weber said. “I think everyone needs to know how hard these students work.”