Jayden John
Staff Reporter

At only three weeks in, the debate season is off to a successful start. At the first tournament of the season, novices Antonia Kainu, Irving Lopez and Chelsea Molina all took home 1st and 2nd speaker awards respectively. Kainu and Lopez also placed first in their event taking home beautifully crafted trophies that now reside in the debate trophy case on Main Street.
This past weekend the novices went to Millard West for their first GOLD tournament of the year. GOLDs are tournaments exclusively for new debaters. Kainu and Lopez took first place yet again, and were joined by Claude Kainu and Stacy Flores-Ramos, who placed fifth. Policy coach and Millard South alumnus Lianna Couillard says, “ They are doing even better than I had hoped they would.”
The next day they were up bright and early for their next tournament in Norfolk. Kainu and Lopez took home yet another win and top speaker awards.
Irving Lopez gives props to his case for taking him far in rounds,”We bring a performance aspect to our debate rounds by talking about marginalized groups.”
“After three wins in a row, they’re going to have go varsity pretty soon. Once you win a GOLD tournament you can’t compete in them anymore,” head coach James Constantino said.
“I speak for Antonia and I both when I say I’m excited to go varsity because novice is getting repetitive and therefore boring,” says Irving.
With the season going well Coach Constantino says,“I am so proud of our competitors.”