Forensics Team Earns Record 35 National Qualifications in One Week
During fall break, the forensic team competed at four tournaments. Across Online Asynchronous Tournament Series (OATS) #1, PKD Public Forum #1 and the Missouri Mule/Carnegie Swing, the team secured 35 more national qualifications, bringing the total this semester up to 39 for the National Forensic Association (NFA) tournament. The team brought back a total of 107 awards, one of the largest single-week successes the team has had in 20 years.
To qualify for the NFA tournament students must reach a sufficiently sized elimination round in a regular-season tournament. The forensic union qualified a wide range of individual speech events this past week, including: duo interpretation, extemporaneous speaking, impromptu speaking, informative speaking, poetry interpretation, after dinner speaking, communication analysis, prose interpretation and dramatic interpretation. In addition, while International Public Debate Association-style debate is not offered at NFA, the events were offered at the Mule/Carnegie swing. The debaters made seven elimination rounds in IPDA.
Forensics dominated sweepstakes awards at the contests that awarded them. Sweepstakes are calculated based on the full team’s preliminary and elimination round rankings. At the OATS #1, the team took second place overall. At the Missouri Mule, the team earned second in individual events sweepstakes against teams such as Kansas State and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL). Debate won its sweepstakes, beating regional powerhouses Washburn, Simpson College and UNL. Coming back to UCM for the Dale Carnegie tournament, Truman crushed the competition again with first place in individual events and debate sweepstakes. They also brought home a special overall sweepstakes award for having the most cumulative points across both days of competition.
At the Carnegie Swing the after dinner speaking final round was entirely composed of Truman competitors. Five speakers went head-to-head, with second-year Cooper Spacil, social issue advocacy major, taking home the tournament championship. Annie Nguyen, first-year political science and environmental science double-major, brought home first in informative speaking. Willow Adamson, first-year psychology major, won poetry interpretation.
At the Mule and Carnegie tournaments, in duo interpretation, partner fourth-year students Briggs Maynor/Alex Peterson and Jessie Phillips/ Maynor each won a championship. Maynor is a chemistry major; Peterson is a criminal justice major; and Phillips is a political science major. Peterson also won impromptu speaking during the Mule. Emery McEvoy, second-year accounting major, won impromptu speaking and rhetorical criticism during the Carnegie tournament. On the debate side, Jack Unsell, first-year environmental science and political science major, took home first speaker in junior IPDA, and Nevaeh Carter, first-year communication disorders major, was first speaker in JV Lincoln Douglas Debate.
