The University’s Forensics Speech and Debate team placed third at the National Parliamentary Debate Association, or NPDA, national competition held in Colorado Springs, Colo., from March 20 to 24.
The team included eight students who work in pairs as debate partners. Juniors Jonathan McCabe and Benjamin Dodds, one of the four debate teams, placed second at the competition.
The team’s co-director, Luke Landry, was astonished and impressed that the two were able to place so high because they had never practiced or competed together before.
“The fact that we took two people who had never debated together until round one of the competition and then they go on to take second is unprecedented,” Landry said.
Neither Dodds nor McCabe expected to do so well at the competition.
“I had (competed with a new partner) before but never at a national tournament so it was kind of intimidating,” McCabe said.
The competition was the first time Oregon had reached the NPDA national final, said honors college professor David Frank, who oversees the forensics program.
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