On Jan. 5, the Iowa City West Speech & Debate traveled to the Des Moines Area Community College to compete at the Iowa High School Speech Association state tournament. After two days of relentless effort crafting arguments, compiling evidence and sending files, ICW Speech & Debate won the overall sweepstakes trophy, securing their state champion title for the fourth consecutive year.

Students excelled in various forms of speech and debate competitions. In Lincoln-Douglas, Faisal Hamzeh ’27 and Spencer Thomas ’24 were semifinalists, and Flora Zhu ’25 was a quarterfinalist. In Public Forum, partners Aahana Gupta ’27 and Evelyn Asay ’25 were semifinalists, and Diana Tivanskaya ’25 and Waad Dafalla ’26 were quarterfinalists. In Policy, senior partners Kamakshee Kuchhal and Jane Lam were finalists. In Congress, Finnley Bonfig ’26 and Lincoln Beihl ’25 placed as Superior Senators, and Rowan Bihun placed with a Medal of Excellence. For more information, check out Tabroom.

Head coach of the ICW Speech & Debate team, John Cooper, encourages students to join because it is never too late to learn how to debate.

“Joining debate is easy. You just come in on Tuesdays to room 133 after school,” Cooper said. “The goal is to come in and get a sense of what different types of speech and debate are happening; you’re not going to understand everything immediately.”

ICW Speech & Debate’s next team competition will be at the East Iowa District Tournament; the winners will be invited to compete at the national level in Des Moines, Iowa.