Esther Oyetunji

Esther has done Speech and Debate for four years, competing in several categories such as Informative Speaking, Original Oratory, and Program Oral Interpretation. As a member of the American Heritage Speech team she has championed various tournaments ranging from Florida Varsity State, The Barkley Forum at Emory University, and Harvard University’s International Tournament. Most notably, she is a two time, back-to-back NSDA National Champion in Original Oratory. Esther is so excited to give back to a community that has given her so much!

Amy Cao

Amy Cao is a current senior at Ridge High School in New Jersey, where she competes in Extemporaneous Speaking and Impromptu Speaking. She is a two-time invitee to the MBA Round Robin, and in her junior year, Amy placed 2nd at NCFLs and 3rd at TOCs in Extemp, as well as 4th at NSDAs in Impromptu. In addition to reaching final rounds at Harvard, the NYC Invitational, Durham, and UPenn, she has also championed Princeton, Pennsbury, and her district tournament. In 2023, Amy served as Extemp Captain for her team. Outside of speech, she loves Taylor Swift, watching soccer, and replaying her favorite movies! Amy is an ISD alum, and she can’t wait to work with everyone this summer!

John Sims

John debated for four years at Arlington HS in the DFW area and graduated in 2011. Coming from a small program, John reached elimination rounds at Colleyville Heritage, Grapevine, and TFA State. Since graduating John has coached LD and PF for Coppell HS and Colleyville Heritage HS. His students have reached elimination rounds at TFA State (including two championships in PF), NSDA Nationals, UIL State, as well as Grapevine, Colleyville Heritage, the Glenbrooks, St. Mark’s, Blake and Berkeley. He has taught Lincoln-Douglas at VBI, UNT, NDF, TDC, and NSD. And now he is thrilled for his first summer here at ISD!

Bo Lint

Bo Lint is the Director of Speech & Debate at American Heritage Schools, Palm Beach Campus. In the past five years at American Heritage Palm Beach, Bo’s students have won tournaments like Yale, Nova Titan, Florida Blue Key, The Tradition, The Glenbrooks, George Mason, and the FFL Varsity State tournament, and have placed top-6 at tournaments like Bronx, Sunvitational, Emory, Stanford, Harvard, and the NSDA National Tournament. In addition, his students have earned over 100 bids to the Tournament of Champions (mostly in Congress), with 41 qualifying to NCFL Nationals and 39 qualifying to the NSDA National Tournament.

As a former competitor himself, Bo knows first-hand the transformational power of Speech & Debate and how much of an impact it can have on students’ lives. He has watched Congressional Debate change over the last 15 years and loves how Congress synthesizes the best aspects of other events together and is constantly evolving for the better. Bo is excited to join ISD this summer!

Bradley Wascher

Bradley Wascher is the extemporaneous speaking coach at Lake Highland Preparatory School in Orlando, Florida.

In five years with the team, he coached the champion of more than a dozen national and invitational tournaments, including NCFL, Harvard, the Barkley Forum, and Glenbrooks, with additional placings at NSDA, the MBA Round Robin, and the Extemp TOC. LHP extempers have collectively earned six semifinals, four finals, and a championship at the FFL State tournament since 2019, alongside 16 national qualifications and 34 bids to the Tournament of Champions.
As a competitor himself for Saint James School and then Western Kentucky University, Bradley won a pair of Alabama state titles and reached semifinals or finals at the TOC, the Extemp TOC, NSDA (including first place in extemp commentary in 2016), AFA, and NFA. Outside of forensics, he also has a master’s degree from Georgetown University and works in DC as a political data journalist.
Bradley joined ISD in 2022 after teaching for five summers at other camps as curriculum director and faculty. He looks forward to sharing his passion for pop music, Coca-Cola, and (most importantly) extemp!

Katheryne Dwyer

Katheryne debated at Walt Whitman High School in Maryland, where she served as President of Speech and Debate and Inclusivity Captain of the PF team. She has competed in PF on the national circuit for three years, earning thirteen career gold and three silver bids to the Tournament of Champions. Over her career, Katheryne earned numerous speaker awards, including 1st speaker at Lexington, Lakeland, and the Harvard Round Robin, 3rd speaker at Valley and Blake, 4th speaker at the Blake Round Robin, and 5th speaker at Bronx. Also notably, she semifinaled the TOC, won Valley Mid-America Cup twice, finaled the Harvard Round Robin, semifinaled Blake (2021) and the Blake Round Robin, quarterfinaled Harvard, Blake (2020), and Stanford, and reached late outrounds at several other tournaments. Outside of competing, Katheryne is the President of Beyond Resolved, where she works to combat many forms of inequity and make debate a more safe and accessible activity.

Jared Shapiro

Jared is currently studying at The Ohio State University and is an alumnus of Hawken School in Cleveland, OH. At Hawken, Jared served as the Interpretation Captain as well as the Vice President of Speech his senior year. Jared was ranked as high as 1st in the country in both HI and POI, and competed since 7th grade. Jared has reached late elimination rounds at many national tournaments including 2nd at Yale, 6th at Glenbrooks, 5th at GMU Patriot Games, 2nd at the Barkley Forum,  Semifinals at the UK TOC, Top-60 at NSDA Nationals, and was a four time NSDA national qualifier. In addition, he championed the Sunvitational, the Stanford Invitational, the New York City Invitational, and was the 2019 OSDA State Champion in POI. Outside of speech, Jared can be caught dancing in public, talking in different voices at all the wrong times, and trying to put a smile on people’s faces. Jared is excited to continue giving back to the activity that gave him so much, and he can’t wait to welcome more Interpers into the ISD family in 2020!

Chase Williams

Chase Williams is the 6-12 Director of Speech and Debate at Taipei American School and founder of The Institute for Speech and Debate. In his 15 years of coaching, Chase has coached students across all events to national success. Chase has coached multiple NSDA National Champions and Top-6 finishers across multiple events. His students have advanced as far as Semifinals in PF at the TOC, and have championed or been in the final round at Yale, Minneapple, The Glenbrooks, Blake, The Sunvitational, Stanford, and Emory. As the Director of Speech and Debate at TAS, Chase has built a program that routinely makes history, including 3rd and 4th place finishes at NSDA Nationals in Public Forum and Policy Debate respectively, and 4 school awards in the last 4 years.

Before transitioning to education and coaching full-time, Chase was a political operative at the local, state, and federal campaign level. He has remained involved in the political arena as a volunteer and fundraiser.

To Chase, ISD is so much more than a summer camp, it is his extended family and he can’t wait to welcome more students into that family this summer!

Maggie Woodward

Maggie Woodward coaches Original Oratory and Informative Speaking at Poly Prep Country Day School in Brooklyn, New York, and has been involved in forensics as a competitor & a coach for 15 years. As a student, she was the Tennessee State Champion in Original Oratory, and a national finalist in 2008. During college, she competed for Western Kentucky University Forensics. She has taught or directed Oratory at multiple summer institutes, including WKU’s Summer Forensics Institute and the Florida Forensics Institute. Students she has coached have been finalists or champions at Wake Forest, Yale, Harvard, Emory, Bronx Science, TOC, and NSDA. She holds a Masters of Fine Arts in Poetry from the University of Mississippi and is pursuing her PhD at the University of Southern California. She is very excited to work with the students in ISD’s new Original Oratory program this summer!

Tanya Roundy

Tanya Roundy is starting her 15 year of teaching. She competed in speech and debate in high school and over the last 14 years has coached at North Sanpete HS in Utah, Mission San Jose HS in California, Alta HS in Utah, and currently coaches at Summit Academy HS in Utah. She has had students qualify to the NSDA National Tournament in Lincoln-Douglas, Public Forum, POI, Original Oratory, Congressional Debate, Dramatic Interp, and Informative Speaking. She currently sits on the NSDA Public Forum Topic Wording Committee and recently presented at the NSDA National Education Conference. When she isn’t coaching or running debate tournaments, she is directing theatre productions and writing.