NOVA’s Speech and Debate Team Wins Big at Nationals!
Last week, NOVA’s Speech and Debate Team (also known as the NOVA Forensics Team) brought home major hardware at a national-level!
NOVA hosted the 94th Annual Phi Rho Pi National Tournament at the Bethesda North Marriott Hotel & Conference Center. Phi Rho Pi is a national speech and debate non-profit organization and academic honor society with a mission to support community college students through intercollegiate speech and debate competitions. Over 50 community colleges and over 500 participants from across the country gathered at the hotel for the week of competition to participate in dynamic performances in public speaking, debate and various types of literature performance and acting events.
This year, President Kress spoke at the opening banquet and celebrated the achievements of students whose dedication to forensics embody the “Go Boldy” spirit of NOVA’s own motto. Following Dr. Kress’ presentation was a speech by a former community college competitor and now famous D.C. lawyer, Mr. A.J. Merton, a partner at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan. Additional speeches were made by NOVA’s CDEIO Dr. Nathan Carter (Phi Rho Pi treasurer & tournament host), Wade Hescht (Phi Rho Pi president, Lonestar Community College) and Rolland Petrello (tournament director, Moorpark College).
NOVA’s small but mighty team of Spencer Salusky, Dhyuthi Chegu and Caroline Castagna represented the College wonderfully. All three students represent the diversity and excellence in our NOVA student population. Formally, NOVA earned a Gold Medal in Individual Events Team Sweepstakes and a Silver Medal in Overall Team Sweepstakes. On an individual level, Dhyuthi Chegu earned Gold in Extemporaneous Speaking and Spencer Salusky earned a Gold in Prose Performance, a Bronze in Dramatic Interpretation and a Bronze in Poetry Performance.
The team is managed by Dr. Nathan Carter and students were coached throughout the year by Professor Jeremy Hodgson and Professor Amy Hileman. Many thanks to the hard work and dedication of the coaches and students for this monumental achievement!
A few weeks prior to the national tournament, the team also won 1st place in Limited Entry Team Sweepstakes at the Pacific Southwest Collegiate Forensics Association (PSCFA) Spring Championship Tournament in Los Angeles and several awards at the Harper College Invitational in Chicago.
Overall it was a very successful season! The NOVA Forensics team was funded by resources from the College-wide Office of Student Life as well by a generous gift from a donor submitted through the NOVA Educational Foundation.
If you are interested in learning more about the NOVA Forensics Team, please reach out to CDEIO Dr. Nathan Carter (nacarter@nvcc.edu), Jeremy Hodgson (jhodgson@nvcc.edu) or Amy Hileman (ahileman@nvcc.edu).
Submitted by:
Dr. Nathan Carter, CDEIO, NACarter@nvcc.edu