This Halloween, the ETSU speech and debate team held its fourth annual Terror on the Tweetsie Competition. The debate competition, named after Tweetsie Railroad, is Halloween-themed, encouraging participants to dress in costume rather than formal attire.
The competition hosted teams from all over East Tennessee. It is not only an opportunity to compete but also to build connections between students at different schools in the region.
The most notable accomplishment, according to Elle Webb, president of the Speech and Debate team at ETSU, was the “amazing success of our first-place novice champions.” The team, composed of Hannah Green, a student at Bryant College, and Kalyn Meecham, a student at ETSU, had never met before the day of the competition.
For the first time this year, “rather than our standard style of four rounds followed by a semifinal and final, our varsity had an epic showdown for five rounds of nonstop competition,” Webb said.
This year, the competition also included a space-themed costume contest. The best costume winner was Meecham, who transformed into Dr. Ryland Grace from “Project Hail Mary” with a handmade sweater and a replica of the other protagonist, Rocky.
The costumes were only part of what made the competition Halloween-themed. The ETSU coaches worked to incorporate the spooky motif with decorations, skull-shaped trophies and a holiday-inspired topic to debate, in addition to the regular topics. This year’s topic was whether the sale of candy corn should be banned.
ETSU’s Speech and Debate team meets in the New Academic Building from 5 to 7 p.m. every Thursday and can be found on Instagram at @speechanddebateatetsu.
