Last weekend Palisade’s Speech and Debate team traveled to Cañon City to compete in a big tournament. In the end, Palisade did amazing across several events filling the podiums and showing the state Palisade’s skill and dedication to the art of debate.

The debate was Saturday the 20th and Palisade students competed in 11 different events. Ian Allen and Keegan Seymour placed third in public forum. Annika Walla placed first in international extemp and Ian Allen placed second. Mila Stephen placed second in United States extemp. Ava Pierson placed third and Willa Henderson placed second in original oratory and Kiera Stephen placed third in Poetry. Almost everyone who competed at Cañon City will be competing at the state competition at Pueblo. Palisade is currently in the top 30 schools in the state and is gaining ground fast. I talked to Keegan Seymour about the tournament and their season overall. Seymour has been doing speech and debate since Junior year. “I think it went really well. It was fun competing in a circuit we’ve never competed in before, it made for a lot more competition and some more challenges, but I think overall we rose to those challenges well and did really well in the tournament. I’m very excited to see where out season goes. I know it’s gonna be a great one,” After competing for a long day the team is back to practicing and preparing for their next tournament, the national qualifiers at CMU. Congratulations to our amazing debate team and good luck in the rest of your season!