Upper St. Clair Speech & Debate Team Wins State Championship

UPPER ST. CLAIR, PA - The Upper St. Clair High School speech and debate team has won its
second Pennsylvania High School Speech League Championship in three years. The team placed first in the Speech Sweepstakes Championship, second in Debate Sweepstakes and took home its second Cumulative Sweepstakes Award, the first coming in 2013.

Nearly 100 schools participated in the PHSSL Championships, which recently were held on the campus of Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania.

In addition to top team awards, Upper St. Clair also earned individual state championships with Paarth Shankar in Extemporaneous Speaking; Riwk Sen in Humorous Interpretation; Hashim Durrani in Dramatic Interpretation; and the team of Devan Ekbote, Mathena Jencka, and Anika
Sinha in Parliamentary Debate.

The complete results are as follows:

• Public Forum Debate

Meghan Joon & Dina Leyzarovich, fifth place.

• Parliamentary Debate

Devan Ekbote, Mathena Jencka & Anika Sinha, State Champions (Undefeated 7-0).
Vivek Babu, Sunny Chai & Jami Stout, third place (semifinalist).
Yash Jajoo, Basir Khan & Ayush Sharma, sixth place.

• Humorous Interpretation

Riwk Sen, Qualifier, state champion.
Maddie Nolen, fourth place.

• Dramatic Interpretation

Hashim Durrani, state champion.
Mayka Chaves, eighth place (semifinalist).

• Poetry Interpretation

Annika Chaves, fourth place.
Anoushka Sinha, 11th place (semifinalist.)

• Prose Interpretation

Richa Mahajan, 11th place (semifinalist).

• Informative Oratory

Neha Patel, 11th place (semifinalist).

• Extemporaneous Speaking

Paarth Shankar, state champion.
Atharva Barve, 11th place (semifinalist).

• Commentary

Antara Cleetus, third place.

• Student Congress - House

Caroline Wolfe, second place (superior speaker).

• Impromptu Speaking

Hridhay Reddy, 18th place (quarterfinalist.

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