We are off this weekend to Gainesville State College for the First and Second Year State Championships! This is a two day tournament for the team, with a cost of $30.00 per student. We leave at noon on Friday, February 3, 2012. The parent permission form, and additional information, is found by CLICKING HERE! A big THANK YOU to the Booster Club for providing our transportation and entry fees!

Results: Congratulations to Isabelle Taft who placed 3rd in Extemporaneous Speaking, Maya Grandoit who placed 5th in Dramatic Interp, and Marius Jackson & Jahra Gholston who placed 6th in Duo Interpretation. A phenomenal effort by these Jesters! Congrats to all who attended… You did Grady HS proud!

This is a very large national invitational tournament with schools from all over the country in attendance.  The tournament uses three different campuses: Policy Debate is at Georgia State. Public Forum is at Druid Hills HS. All other events are at Emory University.  Students need to be at their respective schools by 4:00pm. Ms. Abbott will be driving some students to the Emory campus, and other students have told me they have rides. All arrangements for rides have been made with parents/teachers driving.  Students are, of course, welcome to arrange their own rides if their parents have a preference.  The tournament is BOTH days for all events, with elimination rounds beginning Sunday morning. Students are responsible for their own transportation to and from the tournament beginning Friday night. For more information on the tournament, visit the tournament website : www.joyoftournaments.com.  There is no cost for this tournament other than food.  Students should bring their competition clothes to school on Friday, January 27. A BIG thanks to the Atlanta Urban Debate League and The Barkley Forum for waiving the fees at this tournament. The parent permission form can be found by CLICKING HERE!

Maps to the various venues. The first map is to Druid Hills HS; The next is to the Dobbs University Center (the DUC) at Emory University; the third is to the General Classroom Building at Georgia State in downtown Atlanta.

The North Fulton tournaments created a series of awards for sustained success by individual students/teams at the 5 North Fulton tournaments: Chattahoochee HS, Johns Creek HS, Alpharetta HS, Northview HS, and Milton HS.  The coaches of North Fulton County schools have created 4 awards that will be handed out at the GFCA Varsity State Tournament awards ceremony. The Jesters won three of the four awards:

The Jim Wade Award: Given to the student that performs the best in Lincoln-Douglas Debate.- CONGRATS TO RACHEL CITRIN FOR WINNING THIS AWARD!!

The Ted Wolfe Award: Given to the student that performs the best in Individual Events. CONGRATS TO ISABELLE TAFT FOR WINNING THIS AWARD!!

The Steve Stein Award: Given to the team that performs the best in Policy Debate. CONGRATS TO HOLDEN CHOI AND BEN DEAN FOR WINNING THIS AWARD!!

Milton High School Tournament results for Grady HS: LD, Champion- Rachel Citrin; Public Forum, Semifinalists- Ellen Ericson and Riley Erickson, Isabelle Taft and Ben Simonds-Malamud, Co-Champions. Varsity Policy Debate, Semi-finalists- Ben Dean and Holden Choi. Prose/Poetry, Finalist, Qri Montague, 4th place- Jahra Gholston, 3rd place- Marius Jackson.

Here is the permission form for the Milton tournament: CLICK HERE! Thanks to all who are helping car pool and judge. You are awesome! Names of students attending will be posted on Google Groups.

Grady Speech and Debate Tournament 2012: Quest for the Dream from Ben Simonds-Malamud on Vimeo.

Thank you to the Grady HS Community for a fantastic tournament! The first  Martin Luther King, Jr., tournament saw 122 community volunteers, 301 competitors and 50 Jesters and 18 student volunteers helped us to make this a weekend to remember. A special thank you to Inman Middle School for all of their help. It was a fantastic weekend!

Jesters are required to recruit enough community judges to fill 10 judge time slots for the tournament. The judge recruitment form can be found by clicking here:  Judge Recruitment Form 2011. For additional information, please contact coaches Mario Herrera and/or Lisa Willoughby.

January 6-8, Montgomery Bell Academy, Nashville, TN.  This tournament is by specific invitation from the tournament, and is hosted by the president of the National Forensic League, Billy Tate. Congrats to Holden Choi, Ben Dean and Isabelle Taft for being invited this year!

January 13-14, Quest for the Dream at Henry W. Grady High School.  This is our tournament, hosting schools from Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina. We will host the tournament both at Grady HS and Inman MS. Students are required to recruit judges.  More on this in a different post to follow

January 21, Milton HS. This is the last invitational state qualification tournament open to all student. The tournament is in Alpharetta, GA.

January 27-29, The Barkley Forum for High Schools at Emory University. A national tournament that hosts schools from over 35 states. It is a fantastic time, right next door!

February 3-4, First/Second Year GFCA State Tournament at Gainesville State University. All first and second year competitors attend this championship tournament. 3rd and 4th year competitors may attend to judge.

February  10-11, Marist School. Students wanting to qualify for the Grand Nationals over Memorial Day Weekend in Baltimore, MD, must attend and place in the top tier at this tournament.

February 18-20, Harvard University. This is one of the largest invitationals in the nation. Varsity members who expressed interest in November have been registered and may attend. Detail forthcoming.

February 24-25, NFL National Qualifiers. Central Gwinnett High School has graciously offered to host this tournament. Entries are limited, and those who attend must agree to attend the NFL National Tournament in Indianapolis, IN in mid-June

March 2-3, University of Georgia. This is a great tournament for our policy debate squad.

March 9-10, Westminster Schools (tentative). This is the Varsity State Championship tournament for all those who have qualified for the tournament throughout the year.

March 23-25, Woodward Academy. Woodward host an invitational that boasts itself as the Novice/JV National tournament for LD and Policy Debate.

March 31, Location TBA. This date hosts the Student Congress qualifier for the NFL.

Yolanda King

Yolanda King, eldest daughter of Dr. and Mrs. King, was a graduate of Grady High School. She passed away in 2007. In the spirit of her desire to bring people together from all walks of life and to have a positive impact in the world around her, we are pleased to offer “The Yolanda King Memorial Community Service Award”. The winner of the award will receive a trophy created by Grady HS’s own John Brandhorst. The winning competitor will also have a donation made to a community service organization of their choice, in their name. For more information on the tournament, visit http://www.joyoftournaments.com/ga/grady/info.asp.

The Booster Club Parent Potluck, a “dry run” for our January tournament, will take place on Friday, December 16th at 6:00pm in the lobby area of the Main Theatre.  For more information, please contact Cathie Magnum Power, Alka Citrin or Alison Akard.

Also this Friday, the Jesters will meet after school at 4:00pm in the Main Theatre for our annual “Holiday Gathering o’ People” for some snacks and gift exchange. Freshmen should brings sweets/desserts, sophomores should bring drinks, juniors should bring non-sweet snacks and seniors should bring paper products. The gift exchange is a great way to reward those speakers who have gained the most NFL points… the person with the most points chooses last, and they can either take the last unopened gift OR they can “liberate” another gift already opened and give that person the unopened gift. This process starts with the student with the second-highest number of points.  It will be GREAT FUN!

Finally, four of our Jesters, Holden Choi, Isabelle Taft, Rex Peteresen and Mallory Akard, along with coaches Mario Herrera and Lisa Willoughby, will attend the latest filming of the  ”CNN Dialogues” special  in partnership with Emory University, The James Weldon Johnson Institute for the study of Race and Difference and National Center for Civil and Human Rights. The event is being held from 7:00pm- 8:30pm in the Main Theatre. The theme for the discussion is Lesbian, Gay, Bi-Sexual, Transgender: Has More Openness Led to More Acceptance?  The panel includes Jane Velez-Mitchell, Donna Rose, LZ Granderson, Johnny Weir and Robin Brand. Tickets are available for this event. For information, please visit this website: http://www.jamesweldonjohnson.emory.edu/sub-cnn.htm.

Policy Debate- 5th Place speaker, Zoe Hamilton

Public Forum Debate- 4th Place Speaker, Becca Martin; 1st Place Speaker, Lauren Ogg; Champions,  Becca Martin & Lauren Ogg

LD Debate- Semifinalists, Tiger Li and Jamie Reid; 2nd Place, Tatiana Johnson; Champion, Zoe Schneider

Prose/Poetry- 4th Place, Queen White; 3rd Place, Preston Choi; 2nd Place, Jahra Gholston; Champion, Marius Jackson

Humorous Interp- 3rd Place, Rex Petersen

Extemporaneous Speaking- 5th Place, Omar Skandari; 4th Place, Emily Dean; 3rd Place, Anna Braxton; 2nd Place, Rachel Libman

Duo Interp- 3rd Place, Carter Guensler and Preston Choi; 2nd Place, Ryan Switzer and Deya Bowers; Champions, Marius Jackson and Jahra Gholston

Dramatic Interp- Champion, Rex Petersen

Team Sweepstakes- Champions, Individual Events; Champions, Debate

Members of the team will be traveling to the Lee County High School “Trojan Wars” Speech and Debate Tournament in Leesburg, GA this weekend. We need ALL students competing to be in the Eighth Street parking lot at 4:45 so we can leave as close to 5am. It is a three hour trip and the tournament starts at 8:30am. Because of the length of the drive, we will stay overnight in Perry, GA. All information is on the permission form. To access the form from this website, please CLICK HERE! If you would like information about the tournament itself, just follow this link: Lee County Tournament info.

If you would like the location of the tournament, here is a map just for you…