Speech and debate: Novices shine at Milpitas tournament

December 5, 2008 — by Saniha Shankar and Emily Chen

With the season in full swing, the speech and debate team competed in the two-day league tournament at Milpitas High School on Nov.15 and 16th. All Individual events took place on Saturday. The competition was stiff, but sophomore Soorya Rangan broke to semi-finals in Impromptu and Sophomore Keeti Shukla advanced to semi-finals in Foreign Extemporaneous. Sophomore Vance Lindholm took fifth place in National Extemporaneous speech.

With the season in full swing, the speech and debate team competed in the two-day league tournament at Milpitas High School on Nov.15 and 16th. All Individual events took place on Saturday. The competition was stiff, but sophomore Soorya Rangan broke to semi-finals in Impromptu and Sophomore Keeti Shukla advanced to semi-finals in Foreign Extemporaneous. Sophomore Vance Lindholm took fifth place in National Extemporaneous speech.

“I really thought all my practice finally paid off,” said Lindholm. “It was also really nice to have the support of the whole team during the final rounds.”

All debate events were scheduled for Sunday. Sophomore Karthik Annaamalai and Junior Rishabh Jethandani were undefeated in Parlimentary Debate with a record of 4-0. Sophomores Vijay Menon and Abhishek Venkataramana went 3-1. In Public Forum, freshman Sankash Shankar and Vineet Jain went 3-1 as well.

“I’m very proud at the team’s performance overall, especially for Karthik and Rishaub in going 4-0, earning a wildcard for the team,” said speech and debate captain senior Farid Jiandani, “Things will only get better from here.”

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