The University can add one more national champion to its list this year: the Forensics Debate and Speech Team, which won its national all-around tournament in Stockton, Calif. at the end of March.
The team as a whole, which took 22 members to the competition, took first place over more than 250 teams from around the country. Last year Oregon took third.
“Oregon is in there swinging a lot of weight around,” junior Ben Dodds said.
The individual pairs had an excellent showing as well, the team said. Senior Hailey Sheldon and sophomore Matt Gander received second place in the individual scoring, and multiple freshmen pairs won at least half of their matches, Dodds said.
“To produce like that is pretty indicative of the strength of the team,” he said.
The team is consistent as well; last year a University pair took second place in the individual judging. That pair was Dodds and senior Jonathan McCabe.
Preparation for a debate tournament can be the equivalent of writing a major research paper, Sheldon said, and it has to be done in only two weeks.
Everyone on the team contributes a significant amount of information to the research process, Dodds said, which is when the group must look up current events, public policy, history and other topics to be prepared for potential debate questions.
Before the national tournament, the group compiled more than 300 pages of research. Working together effectively makes the team particularly good at this part of the process.
“It all gets done better than anyone else in the country,” Gander said.
Knowing a topic and being able to create a strategy with the information is crucial to debating well, Sheldon said. For example, in one round the topic regarded “Roosevelt’s employment policy,” but didn’t specify which Roosevelt. The other team talked all about Theodore, but Sheldon and Gander expanded the topic to include Eleanor, which allowed for a discussion of gender dichotomies and won them the round.
The University team sent eight pairs to another national tournament in Berkeley, Calif., from March 21-23. None of the pairs placed, but Dodds and McCabe went into the competition with 60 cumulative points from the season – more than any pair in the history of the competition, Sheldon said.
Dodds and McCabe were upset in the quarterfinal round of the tournament.
The greatest influence on the debate team’s successful run has been the coaches, the team said. Aaron Donaldson, Luke Landry and Erin Ferris are University graduate students, which is unusual – most teams have permanent coaches on staff at their respective universities.
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The University team’s coaches are passionate about debate and speech, thProxy-Connection: keep-alive
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teammates said. “We’re able to stay together in spite of that coaching turmoil,” Dodds said, referencing the inevitable turnover rate that comes with having student coaches.
Ultimately, debate is about teamwork, the group said. “It allows for a lot of collaboration and colliding of knowledge,” Gander said.
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