By: Grace Brown

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, many teams and activities at Belmont have had to adapt to an online format, and the Speech and Debate team was no exception. The Belmont Speech and Debate team conducted their 2020-2021 season over Zoom.

“From the past 15 years of coaching our Speech and Debate team, without question, this year has been… unique,” said Jason Stahl, the Speech and Debate team coach.

This year, the Speech and Debate team competed at the National Christian College Forensics Invitational. “While our team didn’t have nearly the amount of events and competitors compete we normally might this year, we still had some amazing students accomplish some great results,” said Stahl.

At the National Christian College Forensics Invitational, Max Caskie was the National Champion and the National Champion Novice Debate Speaker in Novice IPDA Debate. Carly Crotty was a semi-finalist in the Junior Varsity IPDA Debate. In the Varsity IPDA Debate, Luke Litz was the National Champion and the National Champion Varsity Debate Speaker.

In the category of Duo Interpretation, Alex Joran and Aaron Kleinschmidt were the National Champions.  Alex Jordan was also awarded third place in Faith Literature, and Alex Kleinschmidt won third place in Prose Interpretation.

In Extemporaneous Speaking, Luke Litz was awarded second place. In Impromptu Speaking, Aaron Kleinschmidt took third place and DJ Needs took second place.

In overall awards, Alex Jordan was awarded seventh place in individual events competitor, and Aaron Kleinschmidt took third place.

Belmont was the National Champion in Division III Individual Events and ranked third place overall in Debate and Individual events.

Despite a difficult and different season for the Speech and Debate Team, they truly had a remarkable season over Zoom. “I know that the students in my classes have had to show incredible resiliency just to end the semester strong. To add speech/debate work on top of that has taken extreme persistence,” said Stahl.

Congratulations to Coach Jason Stahl, Assistant Coach, Ryan Greenawalt, and the entire Belmont Speech and Debate team on an outstanding season!