The Forensics team at WJ is a successful, yet little-known competitive club which finished in first place at the end of the regular season, bringing the team a total of nine consecutive county championships. The Forensics team however, has nothing to do with forensic science. “Forensics” is defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as “the art or study of argumentative discourse,” and competitions can include such fields as Drama, Children’s Literature, Persuasive Speaking, Prose, and Humor.


County finals took place March 20 and 21 and WJ was announced as the winner for the ninth straight year. The team had four individual first place winners, seniors Robin Irene Goldensohn, Elizabeth Kang and Amy Hemmati for Poetry, Informative Speaking, and Extemporaneous Speaking, respectively, and sophomore Matt Krug for Drama.

Junior Joanna Miller was inducted into the National Forensics League Hall of Fame, one of only 18 to receive this honor since 1982, and Miller, Goldensohn, Kang and sophomore Sophie Meade were given the Excellence Plaque for qualifying for Finals in five different categories.

The team attributes their success to effective recruitment, lots of practice, and well-chosen speaking topics.

“Mr. McCrady’s commitment to the team and the high level talent here at Walter Johnson contributed greatly to this victory,” said junior Jackson Giuricich, who finished fifth in reader’s theater with “Small World’ by Tracey Scott Wilson. The cast also featured Goldensohn, Kang, Krug, Meade and junior Mateo Williamson.

McCrady also attributed much of the team’s success to a strong showing the extemporaneous speaking category. Walter Johnson students took the top five placing, with junior Ben Ritz in second place, junior Camilla Yanushevsky in third, senior Claire Kim in fourth, and sophomore Tianhao He finishing fifth.