High School Forensics Team Sending a Record Eight Students to National Competition

The Whitefish Bay High School Forensics team is sending a record eight students to the National Catholic Forensic League championships in Washington D.C. on Memorial Day weekend.

The students qualified individually through a tournament at the Milwaukee Archdiocese level, where they competed with other Milwaukee area schools. The top 30 entries qualified for the national competition, and seven of those entries were from Whitefish Bay High School. Only Brookfield East High School had more qualifiers.

This year's team doubled the number of students that qualified for the tournament last year, when four students headed to a national tournament in Omaha.

“We work really hard at qualifying as a team and obviously it’s paying off,” team coach Shawn Matson said.

Six of the students are entering the national tournament as individual entries, and two students are entering as a team:

• Nathan Lafrombois, National Qualifier to NCFL in Extemporaneous Speaking
• Kait Howell, National Qualifier to NCFL in Original Oratory
• Megan Huckenpahler, National Qualifier to NCFL in Oratorical Declamation
• Andrew Gegios, National Qualifier to NCFL in Oratorical Declamation
• Katie Plaster, National Qualifier to NCFL in Oratorical Decalamation
• Stella Mayerhoff, National Qualifier to NCFL in Dramatic Performance
• Kyra Fox and Erica Berndt, National Qualifiers to NCFL in Duo Interpretation

To make the trip to D.C., the team is trying to raise $7,500. So far the team has raised $1,250. Online donations are being accepted here.

The team is also headed to the state Wisconsin Forensics Coaches Association tournament in Ripon this weekend. Last year, the team was named the Division 2 Forensics State Champions for the first time in school history.