Alta’s Speech and Debate team recently won the National Leading Chapter Award of Excellence. Only approximately 3% of schools receive this award, and Alta’s competitive and excelling debaters made this possible.

The Debate team has demonstrated hard work and growth throughout their regular tournament season, consistently scoring in the top 3 teams. The most recent season tournament that Alta won was the Charger Challenge at Corner Canyon High with 10 individual placements.

Aside from their success in local tournaments, Alta also recently entered its post-season, in which they have been thriving. 40 debaters competed in the Regional tournament, where Alta took 2nd place with 101 points, which was only 24 points short of 4-time State Champion Skyline. 

The team also competed in the Sundance District National Qualifiers, a tournament made to secure a spot in the NSDA Nationals which will take place in Iowa, on June 16-21. Only the top 6% of all debaters across the nation compete in it, and Alta successfully qualified 9 members with several alternates. 

 “Attending the national tournament is a huge benefit,” said Rikki Marshall, the team’s Speech Captain, “it looks good on college records, and it is super fun, too.”

Congratulations to all who qualified, and to Coach Croswhite and the assistant coaches, all who repeatedly lead the team to success.

Alta Wins 2nd in 5A State

29 members of the Speech and Debate team competed in the 5A State Tournament on Friday and Saturday. Last year, Coach Croswhite’s first year, the Hawks took 5th place. Only one year later the team brought home 2nd. This is the first time in 21 years that Alta has brought home a State trophy in Speech and Debate. 

Congratulations to our State Champions and all others who placed:

Public Forum Debate State Champion – Megan Davies & Burke Gehret

Lincoln-Douglas Debate State Champion – Alex Jensen

Impromptu Speaking State Champion – Megan Davies

Foreign Extemp: 2nd place – Alex Jensen

Policy Debate: 3rd place – Porter LeBaron & Gavin Fry

Informative Speaking: 6th place – Rikki Marshall

National Extemp: 6th place – Burke Gehret