The Sequoyah Speech and Debate team competed in the state tournament last weekend at Lassiter High School. Both sections competed against some of the best students in the state.

The students in the speech section have a unique role on the team and compete by giving an eight to ten minute speech.

“With speech, there are different events currently,” said Wargacki. “At Sequoyah, we offer [such as] Humorous Interpretation, Informative, Original Oratory, Due, Dramatic Interpretation, and POI which is Program of Oratory Interpretation so all of those events have different requirements or a different meeting.”

The speech section also had some of their participants win awards for their speeches. Scott Benefield and Rebekah Carnes went home with awards for their work.

“Scott is a junior in his first year of speech [and] did HI [Humorous Interpretation] and got sixth,” said junior Nyla Crayton. “Rebekah is a senior and she got first place in HI”.

There are two different types of debating, Lincoln Douglas and Public Forum. The Lincoln Douglas had two participants during the state tournament.

“The way [Lincoln Douglas] works is we get a topic, debate both side of it, and it’s a single event so it’s one person on a team,” said Junior Max Frye. “It involves a lot of philosophy especially political philosophy and incorporating that all into a topic.”

This section also had some success despite the low number of participants and other factors.

“We did pretty well, unfortunately I got sick midway through the tournament and didn’t get to debate on the second day,” said Frye.

The Public Forum is the other part of the debate section. This is one of the most populated sections of the team.

“Public Forum is an event where you have two people working together on a specific resolution that you get at the beginning of the month and it is easier to have a partner because you can share the amount of work you have to put into the event,” said Crayton. “It is also better in round because you have someone to discuss what’s going on.”

Nyla and her brother Caleb both got second and received the high speaker award in Public Forum.

“I was proud obviously for getting it but also somewhat disappointed for not getting first,” said Crayton.

The state tournament is the last speech and debate event of the year and also is a showcase of some of the best from schools across Georgia. However, this had no sway on Sequoyah’s representatives.

“It’s usually the same [as any other tournament] even though this one had higher stakes because it determines who is the best in the state,” said Wargacki. “It was the same because it was the same rounds, same judges, same everything”

Overall, Sequoyah was successful at this year’s state speech and debate tournament. There were numerous awards due to the students work on their cases.