MHS hosts annual debate tournament

  • Sid Rana, senior, Akash Sarkar, sophomore, and Rahul Ravichandran, sophomore, manage room assignments for the Saturday debates. They worked with other students to keep the tournament on schedule.

    Media by Neelansh Bute
    '

  • Competitors from 28 different schools wait in the commons until their debate rounds resume. All competitors are required to go through four debate rounds at minimum.

    Media by Neelansh Bute
    '

  • The judges table on the stage wait for available parents and alumni to judge debate rounds. Around 350 parents and MHS alumni volunteered to judge debate rounds on Friday and Saturday.

    Media by Neelansh Bute
    '

  • Extemporaneous speaking competitors prepare for delivering a speech about foreign events. They have already competed in the same event two times, this time being the semi-finals.

    Media by Neelansh Bute
    '
Navigate Left
Navigate Right

Neelansh Bute, Staff Reporter
March 4, 2016

 

On Friday, Feb 12 and Saturday, Feb 13, 28 schools from all around Missouri attended the annual MHS speech and debate tournament hosted by the MHS Speech and Debate team.

“We held a tournament that started on Friday,” Dennis Kane, fine arts teacher and speech and debate club sponsor, said.” “It ended on Saturday after the debate rounds had finished.”

Kane has taught debate at MHS for 15 years and has overseen the debate tournament every year. However, the tournament itself has been around for 23 years, a foundational part of MHS history.

Although the speech and debate team organizes the tournament every year, Kane said this year was especially unique.

“We had probably eight or nine schools sign up within 24 hours for the tournament, Kane said. “Usually, the sign ups are more steady but this year, it went from a nice and easy 17 schools to 28 schools within a day.”

This year’s tournament had 470 competitor entries, which included entries in various types of debate and public speaking events. It also received help from 350 volunteer judges, some parents and others MHS alumni.

Nevertheless, difficulty always arises in organizing tournaments as large as the MHS debate tournament.

“The tournament was very difficult to maintain and organize properly because it involved so many parts that had to work together perfectly,” Akash Sarkar, sophomore, said. “But with the help that I got from other students, I felt like it was a lot less harder than it could have been.”

Sarkar has been a part of the team for two years now. He has helped run the tournament both his freshman and sophomore year.

Rahul Ravichandran, sophomore, spent his weekend making sure classrooms during the tournament were open to judges and competitors.

“Being a room checker, I thought the hardest part of the tournament was making sure the debaters and judges were at the right time at the right place,” Ravichandran said. “If one timing went wrong, the schedule for the whole day would be affected.”

In the end, the tournament went very well, raising $181.83 for the International Institute of St. Louis (IISTL), a group that provides help to immigrants, through donations provided by contestants and coaches.

IISTL came to the tournament on Saturday to talk to competitors about possible volunteering opportunities

“The International Institute got here in the afternoon and visited a lot of folks,” Kane said. “I really enjoyed the reception our special guest from the International institute got: I talked to several kids and they are planning to do some volunteer work for the institute.”