Team ranked in top 5 percent of country continues success in November

The school’s speech and debate team learned recently that it ranks in the top 5 percent of the teams in the National Forensics League (NFL). It also continued its success at the novice tournament on Nov. 3 and the league tournaments on Nov. 9-10.

The school recently joined the NFL’s elite 200 club, an honor reserved for schools who earned 200 or more degrees in the past competitive year. Based on their participation and success at various tournaments, members of the team earn

NFL points, leading to additional degrees within the organization.

For the first time, the team is now in the top 5 percent of the NFL, the largest and oldest speech and debate honor society.

“I think it’s just a testament to the hard work that the students and the parents and all of our coaches have put in,” speech and debate coach Erick Rector said. “I don’t think our kids do it because of statistics; I think our kids do it because of their genuine passion for forensics, which has paid off in a typical Saratoga fashion of being the best.”

Driven by this passion, the novice team dominated at the individual events (IE) tournament on Nov. 3 with semifinalists freshman Kevin Chow in original oratory (OO) and sophomore Shreya Sheel original advocacy making it to the top 14 speakers. Freshman Megan Shah and sophomore Helen Chen placed sixth second in OO, and freshman Mitali Shanbhag took first place in OO out of over 60 competitors.

“It took me completely by surprise,” Shanbhag said. “There were so many amazingly talented [people], and to think that I could even be compared to them was the best thing ever.”

Junior captain Anjali Manghnani added that the talented freshmen on the team have much potential to succeed at future travel tournaments and state qualifiers.

“As a whole, the team practically swept the entire [novice] tournament, which shows how much effort they have put in so far,” Manghnani said. “It also means we are ahead of the game and ready for this season.”

Following the victories at the novice tournament, the IE team struck again at the Nov. 9 varsity league tournament. The extemporaneous team filled six of the 14 semifinalist slots, including juniors Michael Ong, Jimmy Xiao and Agastya

Gupta, and sophomores Jui Malwankar, Jayee Malwankar and Isha Mangal. Sophomore Gerui Sheng also made semifinals in impromptu.

The OO team also enjoyed successes with senior captain Mohith Subbarao making it to semifinals and Shanbhag placing second at her first varsity tournament.

“I love that adrenaline you get right before giving a speech, and breaking [to finals] just makes it that much more amazing,” Shanbhag said.

In addition to the IE team, the parliamentary, public forum and Lincoln-Douglas debate teams competed at the second league tournament on Nov. 10.

Although no parliamentary or Lincoln-Douglas debaters went undefeated, seniors Justin Liu and Parth Kejriwal finished with a 4-0 record in public forum debate, securing them a spot at the state qualifying tournament in March.