Kansas Wesleyan’s debate and forensics team captured first place in debate sweeps and overall sweeps during the T-Town Swing virtual tournament hosted by Tulsa Community College and Northeastern State University Oct. 22–23.
Overall, 75 percent of the competition’s semifinalists were students from KWU.
Savannah Bonilla (Salina, Kan.) and Abby Wray (Wichita, Kan.) closed out Open IPDA (International Public Debate Association format) and Wray was the Top Speaker for Open IPDA. KWU students placed first in an additional five events.
“Savannah won our first tournament in Wyoming, Abby took second virtually in Florida, and now they closed out Tulsa,” coach Kiefer Storrer ’13 said. “Madeline Norrell (Chandler, Okla.) has also been heavily contributing to our tournament-wide wins. I think we are focusing harder on IPDA than ever before, and that reflects in our success. I am so proud of the students’ overall adaptability.”
Many competitions continue to be in a virtual format this year.
“A benefit of virtual competition is that it is easier to pick and choose where we compete,” Storrer said. “We like tournaments that offer Forensics events as well as at least one of the formats of Debate we do. This year we have been doing a lot of individual debate.”
A full capsule of KWU results from the tournament appears below.
First place, Debate Sweeps (team)
First place, Overall Sweeps (team)
Second place, Individual Event Sweeps (team)
Top Speaker Open IPDA, Wray
First place, Open Informative, Bryce Boyd (Oklahoma City, Okla.)
First place, Open Extemporaneous, Bryce Boyd
First place, Pentathlon, Bryce Boyd
Top Novice, After Dinner Speaking, Billy Holladay (Kansas City, Kan.)
Fourth place, Open After Dinner Speaking, Holladay
Sixth place, JV IPDA, Holladay
Second place, Novice Extemporaneous, Holladay
Third place, Open Duo, Madeline Norrell and Boyd
Semifinalist, Open IPDA, Boyd
Third place, Open Impromptu, Boyd
Fourth place, Open Extemporaneous, Wray
Fourth place, Open Point of Information, Wray
Second place, Pentathlon, Wray
Second place, Duo, Wray and Elizabeth Schaefer (Lyons, Kan.)
Fifth place, Prose, Schaefer
