SPOKANE, Wash. — The Ferris High School debate team qualified for the NCFL Nationals in Washington D.C. They are the only local high school in Eastern Washington to make it to the national competition this year.
Coach Dan Sjolund has led the debate team for 23 years. This year, he did something he’s never done before. He booked flights for the students competing on his personal credit card.
“If I get paid back, wonderful. If I don’t, it’s still worth the experience. I wasn’t going to let anybody not go and have money be the only reason,” Sjolund said.
Nine students qualified for nationals. The other 16 team members will travel with them for support. Coach Dan said he felt he needed to book the flights because this year’s group felt extra special to him.
A couple month ago, the entire team qualified for the NCFL state competition in Seattle.
“Our whole team was walking into a competition where most teams had 4 or 5 people…so it was pretty impressive,” Sjolund said.
The debate team has been preparing for the competition amid other school things, like AP tests and class finals.
“I’ve been prepping the speech for months, and it’s something that’s really important to me,” said Miller Coyne, a Ferris High School junior.
“With debate, you know, you get to see all these perspectives on a lot of issues. And there’s some times where I’ve seen stuff and it’s like, oh, why would ever anybody ever care about that? Then I actually do research into it, and I was like, well, this is actually a really important thing that I think people need to talk about more,” said Jacob Flock, also a junior.
Two weeks before they head to the nation’s capital, the students are fundraising to help cover their coaches’ costs.
Next week, Wendy’s on Regal will host a fundraising night Thursday from 5 to 7 p.m. A percentage of proceeds will help fund their trip.
COPYRIGHT 2026 BY KXLY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED.
