Opening the season as National Speech and Debate Association All State are juniors Micheal Hassel and Meg Hancock, seniors Tristen Miller, Erin Burba, and Brante Green and sophomore Michael Ellen Walden.
Hassel, Hancock and Miller are in the top five in the region, ranked 2nd, 3rd and 5th. Burba is a Tilghman student who will compete for Gatton Academy in Bowling Green this year, while Greene has transferred to a school in Minnesota.
Team coach Martha Emmons, Kentucky Coach of the Year last season, says what’s really rewarding about having these team members named as pre-season All State is that they have been largely overlooked in the past due to the large number of 2014 seniors. The team lost 23 members to graduation.
In addition to the team’s pre-season All-State designees, Hancock, Hassel and junior Palmer Stroup earned NSDA Level One Service Citations, an award given for service to others and the upholding of the core ideals of the National Speech and Debate Association. Assistant coach Todd Ross was named a coach of outstanding distinction.
The team will participate in its first competition is October.
