Debate students on campus competed at UIL Districts on Saturday finishing in first place and now advancing to state, along with two CX policy debate students, Mahi Kosuri and Vihaan Raizada, going undefeated through all four rounds.

“It was extremely shocking to us because we expected to maybe win one round at Tops, too,” sophomore Vihaan Raizada said. “So the fact that we won our rounds and ended up advancing was extremely surprising to us because normally junior teams don’t. Or first, your teams don’t normally make it. So it was extremely exciting for us.”

While most academic competitions involve students preparing with their teachers, Debate teacher Michelle Porter took a different approach.

“So Liberty has three teams of six debaters and every class period, they prepare themselves basically by going over their cases, making adjustments, you know, going against each other,” Porter said. “But I’m there to oversee that. They are indeed doing what they’re supposed to do in terms of tweaking and running cases and things like that.”

But going and observing other debate teams helped sophomore Mahi Kosuri get the knowledge needed to make it to state.

“So we went to multiple competitions spectating, watching our senior debater teams,how they operate, and what they do in rounds,” Kosuri said. “So we learned a lot from them.”