News: Local Students Capture State Titles at VHSL State Tournament

(April 27, 2012) - Loudoun County Public Schools students brought home state titles at the 2011-12 VHSL State Debate Tournament held at Liberty University in Lynchburg. Dominion High School finished runner-up to Harrisonburg in the AA team competition with Briar Woods tied for fourth. Broad Run, which had dominated AA with 13 state titles, moved up to AAA this year and finished runner-up to Lake Braddock.

News: Broad Run Debate Coach Ron Richards Among 2011 Virginia High School Hall of Fame Honorees Chosen

Special to VivaLoudoun via Virginia High School League

Charlottesville (July 8, 2011) - Broad Run High School debate coach Ron Richards is among 10 individuals who have made outstanding contributions to high school athletic and activity programs and have been selected to the 2011 Virginia High School Hall of Fame. Members of the Class of 2011, the 22nd to be inducted, will bring total membership to 225. (read complete release with background on all selected).

The Class of 2011 includes two athletes (Charlie Beverly and Steve Marsee), five coaches (Alan Cantrell, David Crist, Jr., Dave Davis, Spencer Mayfield, Jr., and Tim Sarver) and three contributors (Lora Bickley, Ron Richards and Emilie Tilley).

News: Freedom Debater Finishes 6th in Nation

Special to VivaLoudoun via Loudoun County Public Schools

South Riding (July 7, 2011) - Avi Jaggi, a recent graduate of Freedom High School, finished sixth in the nation at the Lincoln Financial Group/National Forensic League National Speech and Debate Tournament June 13-18 in Dallas.

News: No Debate About It ... Broad Run is Tops in the State Again

Ashburn (May 12, 2011) - Broad Run High School won its 13th Group AA debate championship in the 27-year tenure of Coach Ron Richards during competition April 15th and 16th at Liberty University.

The Policy team of Mary Bobbit and Chetan Mishra took first place with teammates Nick Lepp and Shashwat Sharma (who has sadly passed away since the tournament from a tragic skateboarding accident) placing second. Bobbit and Mishra had an 8-0 record with Lepp and Sharma finishing 7-1 (the loss coming on a coach's decision). Bobbit, Lepp and Mishra were named the top three individual speakers in Policy.

In Public Forum debate, Leah Melcher and Nazaneen Pahlevani finished as semi-finalists with a 5-2 record. In Lincoln-Douglas, Ryan Ceresa and Anjana Radhakrishnan both advanced to quarter-finals with 3-2 records. In Student Congress, Tim Waterman advanced to the Super Session, which is essentially the final round of this competition.

In addition to the 13 state championships, Richards' teams have won their district tournament 21 times and produced 45 individual regional champions and 28 individual state champions.

News: Blacksburg in Tiebreaker over Broad Run for VHSL State Debate Title; Madison County and TJ Also Win

(Apr. 26, 2010) - Blacksburg and Broad Run each scored 16 points at the 2010 VHSL Debate Championships but the Spartans finished runner-up in AA after losing the tiebreaker on the number of first place finishes.

Madison County scored 13 points to win A with Riverheads runner-up at eight and Thomas Jefferson captured the AAA with 19 points with Princess Anne runner-up at 14. Complete individual and team results are posted at http://www.vhsl.org/files/deb-results-2009-10.pdf.

In Classic, Joshua and Rabodice Fass teamed to take first place. Huda Gubara and Dana McCann were semifinalists. In Contemporary, Mary Bobbitt and Chetan Mishra were second with Nick Lepp and Shaswat Sharma third.

In Speaker Results - Joshua Fass was first in Classic and Bobbitt second in Contemporary.

Freedom was seventh in the team results.

In the Student Congress results, Sowmya Banda of Freedom was third and Jay Daniel Gusman of Dominion was fourth.