The Speech and Debate Team have returned from the East Iowa District Speech and Debate tournament, which was held at Iowa City West High on Friday, February 9th – Saturday February 10th. This event determined the qualifiers for the remaining Speech/Debate events for the National Speech and Debate Association’s National tournament, which will be held from Sunday, June 16th – Friday, June 21st in Des Moines, IA. When combined with our results from the East Iowa District Congress tournament on Saturday, January 27th – Bettendorf has qualified the following 8 students to attend Nationals this year:
- Lauren Ballard – Qualifier in Original Oratory
- Kimbree Callahan and Heath Leone – Qualifiers in Duo Interpretation
- Cata Fernandez – Qualifier in Original Oratory
- Cameron Ritchie – Qualifier in Informative Speaking
- Max Rockwell – Qualifier in Humorous Interpretation
- Charles Silver – Qualifier in Student Congress – Senate
- MaKaylee Wilson – Qualifier in Program Oral Interpretation
In addition, we had the following 4 students listed as alternates to the National tournament:
- Connor Hetner – 2nd Alternate in International Extemporaneous Speaking
- Conner Hetner – 3rd Alternate in Student Congress – House
- Hailey Koch – 1st Alternate in Informative Speaking
- Hailey Koch – 3rd Alternate in Original Oratory
- Max Rockwell – 1st Alternate in Lincoln-Douglas Debate
- Joe Terronez – 2nd Alternate in U.S. Extemporaneous Speaking
Bettendorf also won the following additional awards:
- District Speech Sweepstakes Award – Bettendorf won this award through our top 8 placing speech entries across all divisions at the East Iowa tournament.
- Leading Chapter Award - Each year the top chapter in accumulated members and degrees, not more than one per district, receives the Leading Chapter Award. Leading Chapter schools are recognized based on student participation throughout the school year. Bettendorf won this award for our program’s strength from 2016 – 2024. This is the second time we have won this award since I started at Bettendorf.
- East Iowa Senior of the Year Award – Charles Silver was selected as Senior of the Year for the East Iowa District. Coaches were allowed to nominate one outstanding Senior for the award, with all East Iowa member schools voting on the selection. Charles Silver was selected this year for the award.