UA Forensics Team Claims 14th National Title

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The Alabama Forensics Council at The University of Alabama has claimed its 14th team national championship – its third since 1998 – at this year’s Delta Sigma Rho – Tau Kappa Alpha National Forensics Tournament held at The Colorado College in Colorado Springs.

The UA squad beat out 36 other teams, including last year’s national champion Western Kentucky University, which placed second this year. Northern Arizona University followed with third place. UA also topped competition from Cornell

University, Colorado State University, George Mason University, the University of California-Berkeley, the University of Notre Dame, Ohio University, the University of Florida, and the United States Air Force Academy.

Perhaps just as impressive as the overall team’s national championship is the fact that the students returned home with eight individual performance national titles.

“This is a great accomplishment, and even more when you consider we took only nine students in individual events and student congress competition. We did not have any debate students there, and still managed to pull out the win,” said Dr. Frank Thompson, associate professor and director of the forensics squad.

“For the second year in a row (last year’s squad brought home six individual national titles) our students won more individual national championships than any school competing.”

The UA team won by the largest margin in competition history – placing it more than 100 points ahead of second place Western Kentucky University. For each placement won there are numerical points assigned. A first-place showing is worth 18 points, second- place is worth 15 points, etc. For each placement an individual wins in an event, those points are added to all the points won by members of a team. The total of these points determines the top overall school.

This year’s squad included Tharon Moore of Gainesville, Fla.; Matt Stewart of Decatur; Chris LaCour of Lafayette, La.; Ajeenah Rasheed of Birmingham; Sim Butler of Montgomery; Justin Reynolds of Montgomery; Tasha Bryant of Decatur; Paige White of Montgomery; and Matt Chunn of Huntsville.

White brought home individual national championships in dramatic interpretation, poetry interpretation, and program oral interpretation. Stewart garnered championships for prose interpretation and informative speaking. Rasheed and Moore won a championship for duo interpretation, and Rasheed was also named national student speaker of the year. Other finalist positions included:

2nd Dramatic Interpretation – Tharon Moore

2nd Persuasive Speaking – Matt Chunn

3rd Dramatic Interpretation – Justin Reynolds

3rd Communication Analysis – Ajeenah Rasheed

4th Duo Interpretation – Paige White/Matt Stewart

4th Communication Analysis – Tasha Bryant

4th After Dinner Speaking – Sim Butler

5th Prose Interpretation – Tasha Bryant

5th Program Oral Interpretation – Sim Butler

5th Communication Analysis – Matt Chunn

Superior Speaker Student Congress – Matt Chunn

Superior Speaker Student Congress – Chris LaCour

Excellent Speaker Student Congress – Justin Reynolds

The Alabama Forensics Council encompasses the UA debate team and the individual forensics event team. Both programs have a long tradition of producing winners on a national level. Created in 1947, UA’s oldest competitive academic program has secured 71 individual national titles in addition to the 14 team championships. The Council has also consistently ranked in the top three placements at this national competition for 17 of the past 20 years.

Although the Council is housed within UA’s College of Communication and Information Sciences, participation is open to students from all academic disciplines.