The Harvard-Westlake International Public Policy Forum Debate Team was selected from teams across the world to compete in the 15th annual International Public Policy Forum. The team members are captain Jesse Nadel ’17, Allison Gorokhovsky ’17, Dario Madyoon ’17 and Kevin Wesel ’17.

The IPPF is an international essay-writing debate competition in which the top 64 teams in the world compete throughout the school year.

“It was definitely a huge honor for our team,” Wesel said. “This is our first year trying to compete in the program, so it was hard to write our cases at first since we didn’t know exactly what was being looked for by the judges. We’re super excited to continue in the contest, and hope we’ll be able to compete in the final rounds of the Forum in New York next spring.”

The Harvard-Westlake team is currently competing against a high school in Arizona for a spot in the top 32.

At the Damien High School Novice Lincoln Douglas Debate Tournament Nov. 14, Jaya Nayar ’20 came in first place overall, and Anusha Mather ’20 came in second place. Nayar also took first place speaker.

At the Badgerland Invitational Tournament Nov. 13, Indu Pandey ’18, Jake Davidson ’19 and Matthew Gross ’19 cleared past preliminary rounds.

At the Apple Valley Minne Apple Debate Tournament Nov. 6, Cameron Cohen ’16 won top speaker overall, Nick Steele ’16 won fourth, and Connor Engel ’17 won ninth.

At the Damus Hollywood Invitational and USC Round Robin Nov. 5, captain of the Harvard-Westlake World Schools Debate Team Liz Yount ’17 took top speaker overall, Aidan Luscinski ’17 took third place and Pandey received ninth place.