This past weekend, the Big Sky Eagles Speech and Debate team went to a state competition known as the National Qualifier, or Nat Quals, where they competed against other schools from around the state to see who will get to compete against high schools from across the nation in Iowa in June.
Three Eagles qualified for Nationals: Laila Podlipny in Original Oratory, Adalyn Maxwell in the Lincoln-Douglas Debate, and Brady Mcinnis in Big Questions.
“Qualifying for nationals was surreal and there was a rush of pride, as all the work I’ve put in throughout the season finally paid off,” said Laila Podlipny.
A few days before the National Qualifier, Big Sky’s Sun Journal interviewed the team captains for the speech and debate teams about the competition.
“We’re trying to get a lot of people to Nat Quals by competing in additional events,” said speech team captain Tracy Sipp. “A lot of them are doing so well, they’re placing in every tournament so far. They’re just killing it, and I’m just so glad they joined speech.”
Events in speech vary from short prep speeches, to events that take weeks to prepare for and can contain recitations of poetry, songs, personal speeches, or recreations of events that are either real or fictional.
“I would say it’s been quite the struggle for some of the people in new events,” added Lyanna Adams, the other speech team captain.
“There’s just so many roles with each event, and it can be complicated to learn, especially if you’re in more than one.”
On the other side of the coin, the debate kids also did a lot to get ready for Nat Quals as well.
“Well, we have a new topic, so we had to start learning about that topic at the start before we begin writing cases, and this past week we’ve had to finish up our cases and then start writing out blocks to prepare for this weekend,” said debate team captain Brady Mcinnis.
“We’ve had some freshmen in Public Forum, and Lincoln Douglas, and I think they’ve done really well this year. We’ve got a strong outlook on the future of Big Sky’s debate team.”
Debate events are structured contests of arguments between two opposing sides.Each student or team has time to prepare for the upcoming topic that they choose to debate in.
“We’ve had a lot on our plate,” added Tatum Hibbert, the other debate team captain.
“Usually, most topics last about two months, but with Nat Quals it’s only one month, so we have a lot more preparation than we would have with any other topic.”
Hibbert continued. “We’ve only had two weeks to write this case, [when] for the last ones we usually had about three to four weeks, so there’s a lot more stress involved.”
However, this pressure has made the team work together more than ever, according to Brady Mcinnis, “Just working hard to develop these strong cases has for sure made a strong bond between us all.”
The national tournament, known as the Greater Des Moines National Tournament, will be held in Des Moines, Iowa, June 15 through June 20. There will be 1,500 schools and 6,700 students competing from across the U.S. at the tournament, according to the official website.
