Ridge Speakers & Debaters Qualify for Nationals

BASKING RIDGE (NJ) -- Several members of the Ridge High School Forensics Team qualified for the National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) and National Catholic Forensic League’s (NCFL) National Tournaments. Twelve students will represent Ridge at the NSDA National Championship in Salt Lake City, Utah, in June while twenty-seven students will travel to Sacramento, California on Memorial Day weekend to compete in the NCFL Grand National Tournament.

Director of the Ridge Forensics Team, David Yastremski, states, “it has been a great, though challenging season for our students. Qualifying for these tournaments is truly a testament to their hard work and dedication. While many of them manage a very rigorous course load, they prepare, research and compete on a weekly basis from October through March. It takes a lot of work and sacrifice throughout the entire year. It's a great honor for them to qualify.”

The twelve students who qualified for the NSDA National Championship qualified at the New Jersey District Tournaments held at Montville High School and Summit High School. The team includes seniors Vaikunth Balaji, Aria Dandawate, Clare Halsey, Shawn Kant, Katherine Kleinle, and Eric Wan, juniors Vikram Kalghatgi, Shankar Krishnan, Collin Montag, Matthew Perez, and Chandni Singhvi, and freshman Kishan Gandham. Vaikunth Balaji will be recognized at the tournament for qualifying all four years of high school. Yastremski comments, “it has only happened one time before in our team’s eighteen year history and that was Sundeep Iyer who graduated in 2007. It’s a prestigious recognition for Vaikunth and our school.”

The twenty-seven students who will travel to the NCFL Grand Nationals qualified by attending a series of tournaments over the course of the entire year. Assistant Director of Forensics, Danielle Presuto, comments, “qualifying for the NCFL is truly an honor since it recognizes consistency of high performance over the course of the year. As a team, these students demonstrate constant dedication. With 27 students attending, Ridge will have more representation than any other New Jersey high school team.”

The qualifying students include seniors Vaikunth Balaji, Kim Castillo, Aria Dandawate, Clare Halsey, Alicia Jen, Shawn Kant, Katherine Kleinle, Daniel Perez, Rana Shahani, Eric Wan, William Wen, Amy Zhang; juniors Daanyal Farooqi, Jennifer Huang, Vikram Kalghatgi, Patrick Kirkwood, Shankar Krishnan, Benjamin Levy, Collin Montag, Matthew Perez, Sikata Sengupta, Chandni Singhvi, and Mary Zhang, sophomores Anjini Mathur, Ryhan Moghe, Neha Patnaik, Anvitha Prasad, Adit Roy, and Lucy Wei.

The Ridge Forensics Team is currently conducting a fundraising drive to help send the students and coaches to the national tournaments through a partnership with the National Speech and Debate Association at

https://ridge-high-nj.ed.co/ridge-forensics-team Donations made through the website will qualify for 501(c)3 status. Yastremski comments, “with our national tournaments happening in Salt Lake City and Sacramento, our costs are the highest they have ever been. While we have fundraised during the year, including five hosted tournaments, we could still use help from our family, friends, alumni, and community. Every little bit helps.”

The Ridge Forensics team also has two events planned for May.

First, several of the national qualifiers will present at a pre-nationals showcase for families and friends, along with students who may be interested in joining the 2016-17 team on May 18th at 7:00pm at the high school. Interested students can sign up at the Ridge Activity Night on May 2nd; however, preregistration is not required and admission is free.

In addition, Ridge will host their first Middle School Speech and Debate festival on Friday, May 20th at the high school. Danielle Presuto comments, ‘with the recent advent of the Speech and Debate Club at William Annin Middle School, along with an increasing amount of middle school programs in our area, we will be hosting our first middle school tournament in recent years. It's going to be a wonderful event for our high school team who will serve as hosts and judges, along with the competing students visiting Ridge.”

More information on the Ridge Forensics Team can be found at www.RidgeForensics.com.