Varun Kota

Co-Founder of Ascend Speech & Debate and Co-Director of Middle School Speech & Debate

Varun Kota is a Co-Founder of Ascend Speech & Debate and serves as Co-Director of Middle School Speech & Debate. Originally from California, he has extensive experience as a debate coach, previously serving as an assistant coach at John F. Kennedy High School from 2016-2019, helping to transform a team without notable past successes into one that produced NSDA and TOC Champions in Congressional Debate. Varun now serves as the debate coach for the Packer Collegiate Institute.

Leveraging his experience at John F. Kennedy High School, Varun co-founded Ascend Speech & Debate. Since 2019, Ascend has taught 1,000+ students and every champion of the TOC in Congressional Debate this decade has been a member of Team Ascend. Varun graduated Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and is an MBA at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business. In his free time, Varun enjoys traveling to new countries (Spain is his favorite), learning about the intersection between energy and technology, and supporting the growth of non-profits (he has spearheaded ~$75k in charitable giving to two NYC-based non-profits).