Amity Regional HS Debate Team Competes In International Event

From the International Public Policy Forum: WOODBRIDGE, CT — The Brewer Foundation and New York University are pleased to announce the high school debate teams advancing into the "Top 64" round of the 19th annual International Public Policy Forum (IPPF). By advancing, the students remain eligible to win a $10,000 grand prize and an all-expenses-paid trip to the IPPF Finals in New York City.

The IPPF is the first and only international debate competition that gives high school students the opportunity to engage in written and oral debates on issues of public policy.

This year, the IPPF received qualifying round essays from more than 150 teams, representing schools in 28 U.S. states and 19 countries. Each essay affirmed or negated the IPPF topic, "Resolved: When in conflict, a nation's self-interest should outweigh its international commitments to migrants."

Submitted essays were reviewed by a committee of judges that determined the "Top 64" teams based on the overall quality of each 2800-word essay.

"The IPPF presents an exciting opportunity for high school students to engage in issue-oriented advocacy – competing against some of the best debate teams in the world," says William A. Brewer III, founder of the Brewer Foundation and Chairman of the IPPF Advisory Board. "The Top 64 teams now enter into written elimination rounds that will test their research, writing and advocacy skills."

The Round of 64 begins immediately. Teams will volley a series of essays back and forth via e-mail. A panel of judges will review the essays in the order they are presented, and the winning schools will advance to the "Top 32" round. The process continues until the final eight teams are named.

The "Elite 8" teams earn an all-expenses-paid trip to the IPPF Finals in New York City April 24-26, 2020. In New York, teams compete in oral debates in front of a panel of judges that includes professionals in law, business, politics, debate and academia. The IPPF Champion will be awarded a $10,000 grand prize and the Brewer Cup.

The "Round of 64" Teams are:

A&M Consolidated High School, College Station, Texas

Students: Lars Deutz, Allen Zhang, Celine Choi

Alexander W. Dreyfoos School of the Arts, West Palm Beach, Florida

Students: Melodie Barrau, Nirmit Chandan, Katherine Oung, Guyberson Pierre, Miles Wang

Amity Regional High School, Woodbridge, Connecticut

Students: Kevin Lu, Margaret Luo, Arnav Paliwal, Peter Scully, Jack Tajmajer, Zhengyang Wang, Weiss Yuan, Wendy Zhang

Ascend International School, Mumbai, India

Students: Rishi Tekchandani, Arthur Beaugeard, Aditya Prasad

Barrington High School, Barrington, Illinois

Students: Bryce Vist, Om Gandhi, Keegan Teal, Zachary George

BASIS Scottsdale, Scottsdale, Arizona

Students: Katelyn Cai, Shivank Agrawal, Karsen Wahal, Mitchel Wang

Blue Valley High School, Stilwell, Kansas

Students: Ronak Shah, Nikhil Reddy, Aviral Misra, Sam Fine, Shadaan Syed

Brentwood College School (#1), Mill Bay, British Columbia, Canada

Students: Amelia Hadfield, Ben Rossouw, Evan Luksay, Maurits Freybe, Sarah Richards

Brentwood College School (#2), Mill Bay, British Columbia, Canada

Students: Mahir Arora, Ryangwon Kim, Nate Phillips, Michael Wang

Bridgewater-Raritan High School, Bridgewater, New Jersey

Students: Aryan Jain, Aman Wadhwa, Pravar Jain, Tarun Trivedi

Coronado High School, Henderson, Nevada

Students: Abigail Spencer, Sanjay Shankar, Justin Bayani, Dylan Beach, Freddy Nie, Ayda Atici

The Davidson Academy of Nevada, Reno, Nevada

Students: Claire Burkhardt, Tyler Burkhardt, William Contine, Erika Filter, Caitlin Hamilton, Sam Hasegawa, Henry Korver, Sandeep Maligireddy, Reaghan Moore, Brandon Pan, Emhyr Subramanian, Zane Williams

DuPont Manual High School, Louisville, Kentucky

Students: Sarvesh Babu, Smrithi Balasubramanian, Naren Chittem, Elizabeth Gallagher, Pranav Kanmadikar, Demos Negash, Romith Paily, Zain Tariq

East Mountain High School, Sandia Park, New Mexico

Students: Aubrey Amon, Abigail Bryant, Autumn Hamman, Steffen Ortiz, Christian Pereira

East Ridge High School, Woodbury, Minnesota

Students: Matthew Bi, Lan Do, Caleb Moon, Sam Padmanabhan

Enreach Beijing, Beijing, China

Students: Yingshan Zhao, Kuo Liu, Zhiyu Gao

Enreach Shanghai, Shanghai, China

Students: Arthur Zhao, Joshua Chen, Ricky Jin, Rachel Fei

Generation’s School, Karachi, Pakistan

Students: Hamayel Mashkoor, Misha Asim, Rabia Khalid Lakhani, Wardah Khan

Hamilton High School (#1), Chandler, Arizona

Students: Afreen Shah, Meena Nishtala, Shravan Pejavar, Raj Chopra, Sazma Sarwar

Hamilton High School (#2), Chandler, Arizona

Students: Daniel Shih, Nivea Krishnan, Ria Manathkar, Jasmine Sun, Juhi Khandelwal

Hankuk Academy of Foreign Studies, Yongin, Republic of Korea

Students: Kunhee Park, Minjung Seon, Kidon Song

Hathaway Brown School, Shaker Heights, Ohio

Students: Ryan Brady, Sejal Sangani, Shruthi Ravichandran

Hobby School of Ulaanbaatar, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Students: Anudari Naran-Ochir, Misheel Amarsanaa, Baasansuren Erdene, Oyukhishigt Lyndon, Sansar Batbayr

Hunter College High School, New York, New York

Students: Samuel Ahn, Shayan Ashraf, Manon Fuchs, Scott Klein, Max Li

International School of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

Students: Boris Pavlov, Eli Bertuccioli, Jacob Mansfield, Matteo Zocco

Ivy Bridge Academy, Alpharetta, Georgia

Students: Albert Cho, Matthew Kim, Eric Cho, Bobby Missell, Rohit Jivangikar, Brian Shon, Joshua Kim, Allison Wang

Jasper High School, Plano, Texas

Students: Neil Gupta, Charles Hou, Priyanka Gupta, Kelly Hu, Leonard Yu, Tirth Shah, Anushka Kumar

Jayshree Periwal International School, Rajasthan, India

Students: Lakshya Rajoria, Arjun Raj Loomba, Mehul Jangir

John Handley High School, Winchester, Virginia

Students: Malachi Imoh, Samantha Thomas, Tori Stanford, Sally Sydnor

Kealakehe High School, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii

Students: Liam Aspirin, Kea Clebsch, Jasmin Kim, Camylle McDonald, Alexandra Ruff, Henry Schiff, Tye Tabadda

Ladue Horton Watkins High School (#1), Saint Louis, Missouri

Students: Daniel Chayet, Ari Gottesman, William Xie

Ladue Horton Watkins High School (#2), Saint Louis, Missouri

Students: Christopher Chen, Huamin Gao, Louis Li, Zerubbabel Marut, Joshua Wolk

Ladue Horton Watkins High School (#3), Saint Louis, Missouri

Students: Ayush Ajmani, Ashna Chali, Phani Chintakunta, Eli Goldstein, Athena Vinch

McKinney Boyd High School, McKinney, Texas

Students: Justin Chan, Archan Patel, Sam Mauceri, Jack Nulisch, Peyton Childs, Nathan Kennedy

McKinney North High School, McKinney, Texas

Students: Isabelle Agustin, Kayley Barton, Katelyn Hall, Madeline Medina

The Milan Hodža Bilingual Grammar School, Sučany, Slovak Republic

Students: Filip Chobor, Rebeka Demúthová, Filip Kužma, Šimon Pekar

Millburn High School, Millburn, New Jersey

Students: Rose Gao, Agnes Han, Beatrice Han

Montgomery Blair High School, Silver Spring, Maryland

Students: Alex Jiang, Anika Seth, Jonathan Wen, Maxwell Zhang

Mountain House High School, Mountain House, California

Students: Ameya Puranik, Anisha Yeddanapudi, Dhruva Kollikeni, Immanuel Victor, Laiba Bajwa, Megha Nagaram, Saksham Madaan, Udit Karthikeyan, Chandrasekar Kamaraj

New Hope Academy (#1), Torrance, California

Students: Junyong Hong Eugean Choi Jacqueline Chang

New Hope Academy (#2), Torrance, California

Students: Donovan Hwang, Jennifer Kim, Luke Cho

North Allegheny Senior High School, Wexford, Pennsylvania

Students: Jiany Zhou, Emma Scott, Nicole McGaa, Krishna Naik

Notre Dame High School, Sherman Oaks, California

Students: Simon Callaghan, Jack Daggenhurst, Ariana Fotovat, Hunter Rice

The Olympia Schools, Hanoi, Vietnam

Students: Phuong-Anh L. Nguyen, Duy-Hieu Le, Phuong-Hoa Le, Thanh-Trang Vu

Peak to Peak Charter School, Lafayette, Colorado

Students: Ayush Garg, Brandon Guo, Leonard Shearer

Pine-Richland High School, Gibsonia, Pennsylvania

Students: Amish Sethi, Andrew Ni, Samuel Stella

Pine Tree High School, Longview, Texas

Students: Ashly James, Marilyn Shen, Brandy Gonzalez

Plano West Senior High School, Plano, Texas

Students: Aditya Kumar, Andy Shufer, Lillian Ye, Michelle Ma, Renee Li, Rohan Kamalakantha, Shruti Kotha, Suchir Vemulapalli

Premier Debate America, Pasadena, California

Students: Nevin Gera, Ethan Hwang, Benjamin Waldman, Peter Zhang

Saratoga High School, Saratoga, California

Students: Apurva S. Chakravarthy, Sanjana Somayajula, Shivali Kattumadam

Shanley High School, Fargo, North Dakota

Students: Rose Grimestad, Mitchell Krings, Lexi Ochsner, Joshua Ward

St. Christopher’s School, Isa Town, Bahrain

Students: Vansh Patel, Tamara Himani, Saachi Kumar

St. Mark’s School of Texas, Dallas, Texas

Students: Sahitya Senapathy, David Yang, Michael Anderson, Ned Tagtmeier

Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, Alexandria, Virginia

Students: Arjun Aggarwal, Raunak Daga, Rishi Lahoti, Richard Song

Union County Magnet High School, Scotch Plains, New Jersey

Students: Maya Dias, Sayee Edekar, Aashi Mishra, Kevin Sun, Felix Yu

University High School, Tucson, Arizona

Students: Delaney Barrow, Grace Driskill, Logan McGoldrick-Ruth, Samir Rein, Aerin McQuillen

Vienna International School, Vienna, Austria

Students: Gurubharan Ganeson, Gregor Kossmann, Daniel Salaru

Warrenton High School, Warrenton, Oregon

Students: Mara Dowaliby, Serena Moha, Isabella Morrill, Caitlyn Sanders, Elizabeth Whitsett

Whitestone High School (#1), Delta Junction, Alaska

Students: Madison Miller, Abigail Lopez, Tamara Rodriguez, Kristen Miller, Nikolai Chavez,

Casey Seeger

Whitestone High School (#2), Delta Junction, Alaska

Students: Maria DiGloria, William Hasz, Caleb Lawhorne, Justin Greenleaf, Julian Baranoski

Whitmer High School, Toledo, Ohio

Students: Jackson Grefe, Jon Burkart, Ronnie Grondin, Michelle Zheng, Kathleen Inman, Olivia Wetzel, Emily Ly

The Woodlands Secondary School, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada

Students: Sunjoy Xia, Reana Yan, Malaika Mitra, Ali Al-Hasnawi, Louisa He

Woodward Academy, College Park, Georgia

Students: Armaan Ajani, Praval Kandimalla, Saket Surapaneni

Wooster High School, Wooster, Ohio

Students: Anna Nacci, Sylvie Shaya, Sophia VanSickle

About the IPPF and the Brewer Foundation:
The IPPF was founded in 2001 by the Brewer Foundation and is now jointly administered with New York University. The program is available to all high schools around the world – public and private – for free. The IPPF is endorsed by leading forensic agencies, such as the National Association for Urban Debate Leagues, the International Debate Education Association, the Impact Coalition, Associated Leaders of Urban Debate Leagues, and the National Debate Coaches Association.

The Brewer Foundation is a private, non-profit organization funded by companies, individuals and the national litigation firm of Brewer, Attorneys & Counselors. With offices in New York and Dallas, the Foundation has achieved widespread recognition for its efforts to create, fund and manage a variety of educational outreach programs.

Visit the IPPF at www.ippfdebate.com, www.facebook.com/ippfdebate, or on Twitter at @IPPF1.