NHS debate team third in competition

Students from left to right top row: Jeremy Gunter, Connor Harbit, Kelly Clow and Josh Neely. Bottom row: Cody Foster, Donnie Boatwright, Valerie Rainey, Kelsey Hammontree, Anna Jones and Meagan Day.

The Nevada High School Debate and Forensics squad earned numerous squad and individual awards in competition last week.

NHS placed third in overall sweepstakes in the Lamar High School Forensics Tournament on Feb. 18.

Individual honors at the Lamar Tournament include a first place finish in original oratory by sophomore Kelsey Hammontree with senior Kelly Clow taking second in the event. Sophomore Anna Jones placed fourth in humorous interpretation, junior Josh Neely took fifth in storytelling, freshman Donnie Boatwright earned fifth in extemporaneous speaking and junior Cody Foster came in sixth in dramatic interpretation.

Semi-finalists at Lamar include freshman Meagan Day and Boatwright, sophomore Valerie Rainey, and Clow in prose and poetry interpretation and Neely in extemporaneous speaking.

In the Crowder College Reader's Theatre competition on Feb. 16 in Neosho, Nevada placed third out of 14 schools. They performed a cutting from "Poe Into the Night" by Linda Burson. Readers include Foster, Rainey, Hammontree, Jones, juniors Brandon Norton and Jeremy Gunter, sophomores Nathan Hines and Bahar Bagheri, and freshman Blayne Hendrix.

The squad, under the direction of head coach Angie Bin and assistant coach Caitlin Swopes, competes next at the Exeter Forensics Tournament this weekend and the MSHSAA District Reader's Theatre and Speech and Debate Tournament next week.