US Debaters Excel at District Tourney

University School's speech and debate team had a successful run at the National Speech and Debate Association's Northcoast District Tournament this past weekend with 26 students -- the largest number US has ever sent -- competing in the event.

Five students qualified for this year's NSDA National Tournament, which will be held in Salt Lake City, UT, June 12-17.

Omer Ashruf was one of three national qualifiers in Lincoln-Douglas Debate from the Northcoast District. Omer will also represent University School in the City Club of Cleveland's High School Debate Championship on March 11. This is the ninth consecutive year that a University School student has competed in this prestigious event.

In Public Forum Debate, the team of Geoff Schoonmaker and Will Taber and the team of John Mino and Akshat Chowksey qualified for nationals. This will be Geoff's third national tournament, and John's second. The team of Ben Wesorick and Will Frankel was named the second alternate to nationals.

In addition, by advancing to the quarterfinal round, two of the school's Public Forum Debate teams, which had not already qualified for states, Wesorick and Frankel and Schoonmaker and Taber, earned a place in the state tournament.

In Lincoln-Douglas debate, Andrew Gilmore was named the second alternate to nationals and Isaiah Paik was named the third alternate. Ashwin Veeramani was the third alternate in International Extemporaneous Speaking.

In addition to the individual awards, the US Speech and Debate team won two team awards, including the Larry Banks award for winning the most debate rounds in Lincoln-Douglas Debate, and the NFL debate sweepstakes award.

Peter Paik is the head coach of the US speech and debate team. James Lewis '00 is the assistant coach for Lincoln-Douglas debate and Humzah Quereshy '13 is the assistant coach for Public Forum debate.