All photos by Daniel Zhao
Sixteen Speech and Debate students competed at the National Speech and Debate Tournament held in Louisville, KY from June 12-17. Competing with 1,081 schools and 6,470 global entries, the Prep team placed twice—the first time Prep’s team has ever placed at Nationals!
The team also received the Top 20 Teams “Team of Excellence” award for Debate and a Top 40 Teams “Team of Honors” award for Speech. Multiple team members received individual awards and recognition, including Sienna Vaughn ’24, Daniel Zhao ’24, and Gabi Varga ’23, who all automatically qualified to compete at the 2023 National Tournament with their high placements. Lori Jang ’22, Colin Ng ’22, and Neel Sadda ’22 all received trophies and recognition for qualifying to the tournament all four years of their high school Speech and Debate career!
Coach Nicole Dalton received the Second Diamond award at Nationals, which is awarded to coaches with a minimum of 10 years coaching and a minimum 30,000 points attained through the NSDA (coaches receive points through their students’ success in competition).
Three team members participated (and all placed!) in the online National Speech and Debate competition – an opportunity that was only offered to a few students from each competing school. The middle school Nationals competition—also online—took place in early June.
Congratulations to the following Prep competitors who received awards and recognition at Nationals for in-person, online, and middle school tournaments:
- Sienna Vaughn ’24 and Daniel Zhao ’24: 3rd Place in Public Forum debate; each won $2,500 scholarships to the college of their choice
- Gabi Varga ’23: 9th place in Original Oratory
- Colin Ng ’22 and Neel Sadda ’22: Triple Octofinalists; placed in the top 58 teams in Public Forum debate
- Scott Schuster ’22: Triple Octofinalist; placed in the top 64 teams in Worlds School debate
- Thomas Vandenburg ’23: Octofinalist; placed in the top 60 of International Extemporaneous
- Evan Guyer ’24: Octofinalist; placed in the top 60 of Humorous Interpretation
- Thomas Vandenburg ’23: Semifinalist; placed in the top 14 of Extemporaneous Commentary
- Lauren Kim ’23: Octofinalist; placed in the top 60 of Impromptu Speaking
- Wendy Cheng ’24: Octofinalist; placed in the top 60 of Poetry Interpretation
- Daniel Choi ’23: placed in the Top 100 (out of 830 competitors) of Extemporaneous Debate
- Neel Sadda ’22: placed in the Top 100 (out of 830 competitors) of Extemporaneous Debate
- Hannah Pitney ’24: 4th place in Storytelling Interpretation (Online Competition)
- Ellie Sohn ’25: Finalist; placed in top 12 of Congressional Debate (Online Competition)
- Maylin Chen ’24: Quarterfinalist; place in top 8 of Extemporaneous Debate (Online Competition)
- Kaitlyn Lavichant ’26 and Emma Xu ’26: Semifinalists; placed in top 4 teams of Public Forum debate (Online Middle School Competition)
- Ruth Liorsdottir ’27: Semifinalist; placed in top 12 of Impromptu Speaking (Online Middle School Competition)
- Chris Bae ’26 and Alex Bae ’26: Octofinalists; placed in the top 16 teams of Public Forum debate (Online Middle School Competition)