The Apple Valley Speech team started their season with a strong showing at the Chanhassen Invitational, finishing 1st in the sweepstakes competition. Both varsity and novice competitors helped the team earn top honors in sweepstakes, with 1st place individual performances in Varsity by Georgia Schmitt, Nader Helmy, Michaela Brause, David Quinn, and David Roland.

The novices competed at their first competition of the season, representing the speech team well with strong performances in the categories of storytelling, poetry, extemporaneous speaking, extemporaneous reading, and discussion. Freshman Indra Grebin earned 1st place in storytelling while freshman Johnny Chao earned 2nd place. Other novices who finished in the top 6 were Spencer Sanders in discussion, Mitchell Krisnick in creative expression, Paige Nelson in extemporaneous reading, Maddy Ober in extemporaneous speaking, Sylvanna Brown in poetry, Maggie O’Brien and Sarah Reagan in prose, and Stephanie Kahle in storytelling.

In varsity, the categories of great speeches, original oratory, and informative speaking were all very successful. Informative(3) and great speeches(5) broke multiple people into final rounds. Patricia Reeves and Rachel Robinson were runners-up in poetry and informative, respectively. Frankie Szeto, Szumei Leow and Jordan Kuchera finished 3rd in oratory, informative, and storytelling.

Apple Valley debate concluded their season in Minnesota with a strong finish. Varsity debaters Luke Stuttgen and John Granlund were among the best debaters this past weekend at the State Debate tournament at the University of Minnesota. Apple Valley has an impressive record at the Minnesota State High School League debate tournament, and this weekend was no exception.

After finishing undefeated at the section 3AA tournament, Stuttgen and Granlund qualified for the state tournament. This was their second time competing at the State Tournament. At the State Tournament, Stuttgen and Granlund were 5-1 in preliminary rounds, earning the top 2 seeds for elimination rounds, while being the only school with 2 debaters in elimination rounds. Granlund lost his quarterfinal round, while Stuttgen advanced on a 3-0. In the semifinal round, Stuttgen lost on a 3-2 to the eventual State Champion.

Congratulations to both debaters on a fantastic end to a great season!

From storytellers

” Seven storytellers from the AVHS speech team visited Westview Elementary to talk with students about the tradition of storytelling, Wednesday, December 7th. Not only did they have a chance to talk about why storytelling is important, but they also got the opportunity to perform a few of their stories, which come from the Grimm Brother collection. Kindergarten, first and second grade students were pretty excited to see the stories and, on occasion, participate.

Apple Valley debate capped off a strong season with a fantastic performance at the MDTA JV/Novice State Debate Tournament.

The team of freshmen and sophomores earned 3rd in the team sweepstakes award, despite only having entries in 2 of 6 divisions. Sophomore Jonathan Morrow finished 1st and earned the title of “State Champion”.

In the novice division, freshman Grace Hoffa concluded her impressive season by finishing in 2nd place. After finishing 6-0 in preliminary rounds, Hoffa advanced into elimination rounds and won her quarter-final and semi-final round to end up in the final round. Seven Apple Valley novice debaters advanced into elimination rounds with winning records. Freshmen Margo Sanders, Neelam Chandiramani, Chris Ramsumair, and Malini Wijesinghe, and Alauna Hagerty finished with 4-2 records in preliminary rounds. Hagerty won her double-octofinal round to advance to the octofinals round. Devin Everaert finished with a 5-1 record as well.

In Junior Varsity, Apple Valley advanced 3 debaters to elimination rounds. In addition to Jonathan Morrow winning 1st place, sophomores Andrea Aguilar and Laura Wolff finished with 4-2 records. Aguilar won her octo-final and quarter-final rounds to advance to the semi-final. Morrow finished 5-1 in preliminary rounds. Every other junior-varsity debater finished with at least a 3-3 record in preliminary rounds.

Apple Valley Debate continued their strong season this weekend in 2 separate tournaments at both Forest Lake High School and Highland Park Senior High School.

Competing at the Capital City Debate invitational in Lincoln-Douglas debate, Apple Valley debaters in all 3 divisions performed impressively. Senior John Granlund went 4-2 in preliminary rounds, advancing to the semifinals. Granlund won his semifinal round and the final round against debaters from Eagan and St. Thomas Academy to win the tournament!

Senior Luke Stuttgen and junior Miriam Kelberg also finished 4-2, just missing out on semifinals in 5th and 6th place. In junior varsity, sophomore Maddy Ober finished 4-2 in 5th place. Apple Valley novices also continued their impressive start to their debate careers. Freshmen Chris Ramsumair, Megan Smith, and Ashley Suter all finished 5-1 and earned 4th, 5th, and 7th place respectively. Freshmen Jon Crepeau, Devin Everaert, and Malini Wijesinghe also went 4-2. In public forum debate at Forest Lake, Apple Valley debaters competed well and faced strong competition. The team of Spencer Sanders and Crystal Ramsumair went 3-2.

The Minneapple Debate Tournament was held at Apple Valley High School last weekend (Nov. 4-5th). Over 750 competitiors in 3 types of debate from 20 states competed on Friday and Saturday. The Apple Valley Debate team had a superb showing at their own tournament in JV and Novice LD and Congressional Debate.

Novice Grace Hoffa continued her impressive start to the season by winning the Novice LD division and finishing with an undefeated record through preliminary and elimination rounds!

Facing students from 4 different states and in 4 different elimination rounds, Hoffa won every round to finish 10-0 for the tournament. Novice Maddy Ober was 4-2 in preliminaries and won her first elimination round and finished in the top 8 in the novice division. Ober and Hoffa also finished as 5th and 9th speakers, respectively. Novices Alauna Hagerty, Margo Sanders, and Megan Smith also were 4-2, but missed elimination rounds on speaker points. Beginning with the Lakeville North Tournament on October 15th, Grace Hoffa has won 21 rounds in a row!

In the JV Lincoln-Douglas division, sophomore Jordan Larson finished 4-2 in preliminaries, but debated strong in elimination rounds to finish in the top 4. Reaching the semifinals as the 15th out of 16th seeds, Larson beat the 2nd and 10th seed to have a strong finish to the tournament.

In Congressional Debate, junior Rand Silvers made it to the final session. In his first Congressional Debate tournament of the season, Rand finished 2nd out of 15 in the preliminary rounds in his chamber, Silvers earned a spot in the Tournament of Champions bid round.

Apple Valley debaters continued their impressive start to the season at both local and national tournaments.

At the Lakeville North debate tournament, debaters in novice and junior varsity were crowned champions of their respective divisions. In novice debate, freshman Grace Hoffa won finished undefeated (5-0), top speaker, and won the final round on a 3-0 decision. Freshman Maddy Ober finished 4-1 as well. Some novices who did not compete at Lakeville South had an impressive start to their season. Freshmen Jennifer Suter and Devin Everaert finished 4-1, despite not competing last weekend. In the junior varsity division, Apple Valley closed out the top 3. Sophomore Jonathan Morrow finished 5-0 and was top speaker, sophomore Jordan Larson finished 5-0 in 2nd place, while sophomore Andrea Aguilar finished 5-0 and missed 2nd place by half of a speaker point. In public forum, the team of Whitney Bellant and Crystal Ramsumair finished in 4th place while in junior varsity, Jacob Shawback and Beth Russo finished in 5th place.

At the Heart of Texas invitational at the St. Marks School in Dallas, TX, senior Luke Stuttgen earned his 2nd bid for the Tournament of Champions. After finishing 5-1 in preliminary rounds, Luke made it all the way to the semifinal round of the tournament before being eventually defeated on a 2-1 decision. Senior John Granlund finished 4-2 and dropped in the double-octofinal round on a 2-1, while junior Miriam Kelberg finished a strong 3-3 after starting the tournament 3-1.

Congratulations to all debaters on an incredibly successful and victorious weekend!