More than 500 schools from over 30 states entered the 71st annual Barkley Forum for Speech and Debate Tournament, a national competition long regarded as one of the most demanding events in high school forensics. Hosted by Emory University, the Barkley Forum attracts programs with deep resources, national reputations, and decades of competitive history.
Students from David Thibodaux STEM Magnet Academy were prepared to meet them there. Days before competition began, winter weather made travel unsafe. Instead of canceling, tournament organizers made a rare decision for an event of this scale. The entire competition moved online. Hundreds of schools. Thousands of performances. All virtual.
For competitors, the shift stripped away the familiar. No performance rooms. No shared audience energy. No margin for technical error. Every round demanded the same precision, interpretation, and control, now delivered through a screen, recorded and judged under national scrutiny.
David Thibodaux students did not retreat from that moment. They advanced.
Against one of the largest fields in the country, multiple students reached final rounds. And in Program Oral Interpretation, Gavin Crayton emerged as the Barkley Forum Champion, outperforming competitors from across the nation in one of the tournament’s most competitive categories.
The significance of that result is not symbolic. National circuit wins at the Barkley Forum are recognized by colleges, scholarship committees, and academic programs as indicators of advanced communication skill, analytical depth, and sustained discipline. They reflect months of preparation and the ability to perform under conditions that are neither predictable nor comfortable.
That kind of success does not happen by accident.
At LPSS, opportunity is built to withstand that test. Students are given access to nationally competitive experiences and the preparation required to meet them. When circumstances shift, the opportunity remains, and students are expected to adapt.
The tournament venue changed. The standard did not.