by Brandy Voirin/reporter

Words were students weapons of choice when the NE forensic speech and debate team competed in two events and captured the top community college overall award for the Cameron University Christmas Classic tournament Dec. 5 in Lawton, Oklahoma.

Team members Montana Parish and Hayden Culbreth finished as top four in the open division. First-year students Cecilia Silva and Alessandro Vidal finished with the top four and Kristen Conard and Shane Brewer finished with the top six. Silva also finished fourth in the pentathlon.

First-year coach and associate professor of speech Daniel Schabot said twice-weekly practices and extra weekend practices and speech writing helped tremendously.

“The team focuses on group success as much as they do individual successes,” he said. “The group is relatively inexperienced and worked very hard to achieve a high level of success quickly.”

At the West Texas A&M half of the tournament in Lawton on Dec. 6, the team was awarded second overall out of 13 schools in the debate sweepstakes.

“They are performing well above my initial expectations,” he said.