U-High debaters named to the Illinois All-State debate team, and among top 10 policy speakers
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Mahi Shah (left), and Cyrus Esmailzadeh (right)

U-High debaters named to the Illinois All-State debate team, and among top 10 policy speakers

The U-High debate club had two teams—ES and DR—compete in Illinois High School Association’s (IHSA) 2023 state policy debate championships tournament at Lab during Spring Break, March 17-18.

“[Team DR] Sasha Duda and Siddarth Reddy ended the tournament with an even, 5-5 prelim record, just short of eliminations by a ballot,” Serena Thomas, one of U-High’s debate captains, says. “[Team DS] Mahi Shah and Cyrus Esmailzadeh had a 7-3 prelim record and made it to the quarterfinals of the tournament, losing on a close 2-1. Mahi Shah and Cyrus Esmailzadeh were both named to the Illinois All-State Debate team, and were awarded overall fifth and seventh speaker respectively.”

There were forty-two teams from eighteen schools that competed at IHSA this year. The debate topic was “Resolved: The United States Federal Government Should Substantially Increase Its Security Cooperation with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in One or More of the Following Areas: Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Cybersecurity.”

Although only two teams competed in the IHSA's tournament, the U-High debate team is made up of twenty-two members ranging from tenth to twelfth graders. The team practices every week and has traveled across the United States throughout the year competing in tournaments.

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From left to right: Sasha Duda, Mahi Shah, Cyrus Esmailzadeh, and Siddarth Reddy

“Both teams that competed at IHSA are very driven, and work hard to do research everyday to ensure that they were prepared for the tournament,” Thomas says. “We hope that the students gained experience competing at a highly competitive level. This tournament was a fantastic way for the students to show off all the work that they put in throughout the season.”

This was the first time that IHSA held a state debate championship tournament at Lab. According to IHSA’s website, the debate tournament had two locations: Lab was chosen for policy debate state finals, and the Illinois State University in Normal, IL was chosen for the Congress, Lincoln-Douglas, and Public Forum debate finals categories.

In February, IHSA’s board of directors announced the hosting plan. According to IHSA Assistant Executive Director Susie Knoblauch, the change was done for greater participation in the policy debate finals. “We found that we traditionally have no schools south of Interstate-80 that participate in policy debate, so moving the state finals in policy debate to Chicago will allow for many more students to participate, while not enacting additional travel burdens on other participating schools.”

Lab is grateful that IHSA chose us to host the 2023 tournament!

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