by Melsissa Brisco

On April 10, the Coppell High School debate team hosted a garage sale in the CHS parking lot. The garage sale was held in order to raise money for the debate team members who qualified for the Tournament of Champions. Two CHS teams qualified for this prestigious tournament: junior Priyanka Krishnamurthy and her partner senior Joey Donaghy along with junior Sarah Mithani and her partner Sonali Kalvala.  

The Tournament of Champions is held each year in May and is the most prominent tournament in the “National Circuit.” The National Circuit is made up of an elite group of public and private schools that have a history of excelling in debate tournaments.  The Tournament of Champions, annually held at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, was founded in 1972 and since then has taken the spot of the high school debate premier championship. The Tournament of Champions does not control other debate tournaments, so it relies on results from other tournaments to qualify for the Tournament of Champions.

“To qualify for the Tournament of Champions, you have to get two ‘bids’,” Donaghy said. “You get a bid by advancing far enough at certain tournaments that are considered Tournament of Champions qualifiers.”

 This honor for the two teams is not something that Coppell has never experienced, however. CHS has a history of advancing to this tournament.

“I’ve been working here [at Coppell High School] for seven years and we’ve had kids advance [to the Tournament of Champions every year except the first year I was here,” debate coach Glenda Ferguson said.

Donaghy clarified that only two current debate team members have advanced before, the students who have advanced, advanced in different categories.

The garage sale was held all day Saturday and raised over $600 for the team. Featured at the garage sale were items such a table and chair set to books and various clothing items. Items at the garage sale were donated by debate students or teachers that volunteered to help the debate team out. Also, items not sold at the IB garage sale, which took place the weekend prior, were for sale at the debate garage sale.

“The garage sale went really well,” senior debater Jessie King said. “We raised quite a bit of money. I would consider the garage sale a success, but we are still hoping to raise more though, because the cost of sending four members to the contest is so high.”

Although the debate team was able to raise a substantial amount of money, they were not able to meet their goal of $1,100. This would pay for the majority of the four students travel expenses.

“We will probably have another fundraiser,” Ferguson said. “We are thinking something like a night at a restaurant where we get a portion of the proceeds.”

 “We hosted the garage sale because we don’t have any money and we need it,” Donaghy said. “A lot of people don’t know this, but debate travels a bunch when we have to compete, and flights, hotels, rental cars and having our tubs [of debate material] checked adds up really fast, especially when you have nationals weird places like Kansas and Kentucky.”