Stuy S&D Update #8: April 11, 2025

Hello Speech & Debate families!

Stuyvesant had a wonderful  time competing at the NYSFL State Championship this past weekend. With over 85 students qualified to compete, Stuyvesant had a very strong showing with 6 champions in both Speech and Debate. We are incredibly proud of everyone who participated in the tournament; all of their hard work has truly paid off. 

A big thank you to all the parents who took the time to come to the Bronx on a weekend and served as judges. We couldn’t do this without your help and the help of Dr Yu and the administration, the Alumni Association, the Parents’ Association, Dina Ingram and of course, Ms Sheinman.

After our success at the State Championship, we are looking forward to the National Catholic Forensics League tournament in Chicago this coming May. If you’d like to help get us there, please consider sponsoring our team at this link. Every dollar goes a long way to getting us to Chicago. 

We are, as always, incredibly thankful for all of your support. 

Best,

The S&D Team

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Team Updates

Extemp:

Stuy Extemp knocked States out of the park! With freshman Sam Bokor placing 5th as a finalist in JV and sophomores Caitlyn Chan and Melanie Xie making it to quarterfinals in JV Extemp, we had a weekend full of success and fun. A huge thank you to the judges who came to help all 15 state qualified extempers compete— a record delegation to States. We are excited to continue practicing using the feedback we gained. On to Catholic Nationals and next season!

Public Forum:

Public Forum had an amazing time at states! Congratulations to seniors Astrid Harrington and Helen Mancini, who championed the varsity division! Also, congratulations to juniors Annie Li and Solomon Binyaminov for making it to varsity octafinals. Congrats to sophomores Lander Bovenzi, Adrien Devery-Michaelson, Ethan Zheng, and Archie Ovitigala for breaking to JV doubles, and congratulations to freshmen Calista Harrington and Arya Rajda for making it to novice octafinals. PF killed it at states, and we can’t wait to do the same at Catholic Nationals!

Congress:

This weekend, Stuy Congress was a smashing success at the NYSFL State Championships. In all, 15 Congress debaters competed. Juniors Ellis Thompson and Raymond Chen as well as sophomore Lyla Storm made it to semifinals, and freshman (!!) Alice Frank, junior Louis Oh-Aronson, and senior Daniel Prizant made it all the way to finals, securing 12th, 10th, and 2nd place in NY respectively. Stuy Congress also won 2nd place out of the entire state in the Congressional Debate sweepstakes, all thanks to the hard work and success of our debaters.

Lincoln Douglas:

LD rocked it at states!! Qualifying a total of 15 debaters across three divisions, we spent an abnormal amount of time in Bronx Science’s basement and placed 5th in overall Lincoln Douglas sweepstakes. In novice, freshman Emily Johnson was the seventh seed and was an octafinalist. Also in novice, sophomore Chloe Wang was the sixth seed and a quarterfinalist. Freshmen Ben Hayes and Ethan Chen also had positive records! In junior varsity, sophomore Emma Lin was the sixth seed and an octafinalist; sophomore Mufei Yu was 10th seed, third speaker, and a quarterfinalist! Sophomore Alexis Qian also went positive before suffering a tough 3-2 loss. In varsity, junior Yuna Lee was eighth seed, sixth speaker, and a quarterfinalist. Finally, senior Daniel Zheng was the ninth seed, seventh speaker, and an octafinalist! LD has had a wonderful season this year and will have an even better one next year. Catch Daniel at NCFL Grands debating the LD novice topic to close out his career!

Parli:

Parliamentary debate has had a great past few weeks doing practice rounds and running drills in preparation for our final tournament of the year!. 

Policy:       

While the NYSFL State Championships unfortunately don’t offer policy, we’ve remained hard at work! The team has already started preparing for next year's topic on American exploration and development in the Arctic, researching policy proposals from the past. Juniors Kassandra Sinchi and Rahul Kissoon and seniors Atiya Firooz and Salioudian Barry have also been getting ready for Catholic Nationals in May. Wish us luck!

Speech:

Speech had a great showing at States! In Declamation, sophomore Mariya Markova earned second place overall, and sophomore Ananya Gupta made it to quarterfinals. In Duo Interpretation, the team of junior Sofia Lawrence and senior Daniella Solomon CHAMPED! The team of junior Lily Wagman and junior Henry Santos Hendricks made it to the final, securing themselves an impressive 6th place. In Humorous Interpretation, junior Audrey Hilger earned first place and junior Sofia Lawrence earned 7th in the final! In Oral Interpretation, sophomore Milan Gittens CHAMPED the JV category while junior Olivia Cisse earned an impressive 3rd place in Program OI. Finally, junior Amanda Greenberg took home second place in Original Oratory! It was a great weekend for Stuy Speech, with our team taking home second in Speech Sweepstakes. Congratulations to everyone who competed this weekend!

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Thank you for taking the time to read this update! We appreciate your time and effort to support the team. Don’t hesitate to reach out with any concerns or ideas.

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If you have any questions or would like to provide feedback, don't hesitate to reach out to us by responding to this email or contacting stuy4n6@gmail.com and jlin56@stuy.edu. We will get back to you as soon as possible.

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