Thacher’s Debate Society Pulls in Two Victories
Two first-place awards for Original Oratory and Extemporaneous Speech went to Eli B. ’25, and Ethan S. ’26, respectively, in the 2nd Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Speech and Debate Invitational hosted by the Dunn School last weekend. Eli and Ethan were joined by fellow teammates Wiley M. ’26 and Angus H. ’25. Students representing elementary, middle, and high schools in Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties were on hand to participate.
Faculty advisor Jake Conway offered that “he’s proud of their successes at our first off-campus event.”
Ethan’s Extemporaneous topics allowed for 30 minutes of preparation time for each round of topics. The three preliminary rounds plus the Final topics were: “the death penalty should or should not be abolished,” “the United States should or should not mandate voting participation,” “we should or should not change the culture of tipping (in restaurants, etc.),” and finally “drones are or are not making a difference in the war in Ukraine.”
Eli’s Original Oratory speech topic was: the importance of speaking with strangers. Then, following a unique format for this event, Bouganim made it to the finals in the Impromptu category with such topics as “music is like a drug,” “rizz and charisma,” “the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you (Neil Degrasse Tyson).”
Read more about the Dunn School’s speech and debate event in the Santa Ynez Valley News article here.
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