After many years of incredibly strong returning students dominating our Middle School Qualifying process, this year’s qualifying process was a wide open field, with only three returning qualifiers in the pool. 

We are excited to see some new faces and new schools representing the region. 

DC International has been a strong participant at MS Nationals in the past, but it has been four years since they qualified for the tournament. Indeed, the last time DCI qualified, Parker McCauley was in 8th grade (now representing us at HS Nationals as a Senior from Banneker High School). We knew that hiatus was going to be temporary, with 8th graders Claudia Hyman-Jimenez and Addie Worsley almost qualifying last year as 7th graders. They’ve had a great season this year, winning a number of awards across the local level and going to several regional tournaments. Indeed, they even stole a ballot from our ToC qualifiers from BASIS DC.

Eliot Hine’s Bobby Thorn qualified to Middle School Nationals last year, and was in elimination rounds, but his partner graduated. Indeed, his initial choice for partner transferred out of the school, but then Louise transferred in from KIPP DC. They’ve gone on to set some records this year, including Louise getting multiple speaker awards at regional tournaments, and the pair in the final round of the JV breakout at Lexington, a regional high school tournament. 

Jack Graber and Izzy Pessey are among our most experienced Middle School Debaters, with multiple years of attending regionals, competing in high level events, and winning lots of trophies. They’ve competed in Varsity all year, even at regionals, and have debated a lot of high level opponents. Since they’re used to debating high school upper classmen, facing off against their 8th grade peers is a breeze. They are joined this year by the next generation of debaters at Hardy, Theo and Nate. They went to their first regional at the Dragon, and have come along a bit more slowly, but are great heirs to the Hardy debate legacy that has been qualifying folks for MS Nationals since they hosted the tournament in 2017 (and Nate’s sister was a quarterfinalist). 

Stuart Hobson has been one of the most dominant Middle School teams in the country over the last few years. The team has been huge, and has been in the semifinal rounds or better of Middle School Nationals for four years in a row. They then graduated 23 of their 27 more experienced debaters. Marshall Thorpe, Fiona Levett, Ian Nwagwu, and Zeve Ben Shalom have spent the season proving to everyone that just because the names are changing, opponents still need to respect Stuart Hobson in highly competitive spaces.