Schools

Roeper Receives $100,000 for Forensics, Debate Programs

The new fund created by a pair of Roeper parents will be used to subsidize the costs of tournament appearances and pay for assistant coaching positions.

The Birmingham- and Bloomfield Hills-based has received $100,000 for the school's forensics and debate program.

The school, which has its middle and high school campus on Adams Road in Birmingham, received the money from the newly-developed Bernard Family Debate and Forensics Endowment Fund. The fund was created by Dennis and Hadas Bernard and their son Aaron, a rising senior at Roeper.

"Only a few years ago, we took five or six Upper School students to states in forensics," said forensics coach and Roeper teacher Dan Jacobs. "This year, 35 out of 36 students qualified for the state competition held at Western Michigan University in the beginning of May. Ten finished as finalists and the overall high quality of the team led to our finishing second in the state of Class C/D, which includes many larger schools.

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"Thanks to the Bernards' generosity, our students will be able to compete at the state and national levels they are qualified for, unhindered by the costs to practice for and travel to these competitions," Jacobs added.

According to Dennis Bernard, they created the fund after seeing the value of the skills Aaron was learning through his participation in forensics and debate, skills they see as invaluable.

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"This endowment will, for years, allow Roeper, all of its students and our community, the opportunity to be able to learn to express our feelings, wisdom, and views with clarity of thought and passion of delivery," said Dennis.

Aaron agrees, saying he participates in forensics for the "irreplaceable amounts of knowledge in public speaking, the art of rhetoric and analytics."

Income from the Bernard fund will be used to subsidize the costs of regional and national tournament appearances and sustain assistant coaching positions.

"We welcome the opportunity to ensure the extraordinary tradition of success for debate and forensics at Roeper," said Roeper's development director, Denita Banks-Sims. "This kind of support is deeply appreciated."


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