Every year a national debate resolution is released and high school debate teams across the country create and advocate for and against tens of thousands of pages of research on the topic. This was my 16th year coaching which means 16 topics. Throw in the topics I researched and debated myself as a high school and college debater are we are now in the ball park of 25. A few years back I thought high school policy debate would go away under the auspices of budget cuts but surprisingly there seems to be the beginning of an understanding that policy debate teaches all those critical thinking, writing, and research skills that are deemed so useful in the real world and not only are those of us who have been holding on to programs by our fingernails still here but there even seem to be some new one on the horizon. There is a movement afoot based on data to use debate as a tool to increase academic achievement in the Detroit School system through something called The Detroit Urban Debate League. The data suggests that even a minimal level of exposure to policy debate can significantly , statistically speaking, improve academic achievement. I can speak from experience that I have former debaters who are wildly successful. There are doctors, chemists, social workers, engineers, zoologists, of course lawyers, and very importantly – to me any way- teachers. They have terminal degrees from: UofM, MSU, GVSU, Northwestern, University of Minnesota, Harvard, and Yale to name a few. More importantly than all that they are critical thinkers. They know how to research a subject and to search for truth in data. This past year I had a brand new group of rock star novices who are excited to commit to debate at a high level. As novices they had an even record and worked their tails off. I am excited to have any students participate in the activity at any level but highly committed students are really exciting. May policy debate continue to be a tool to teach critical thinking and build amazing, capable, thoughtful people and may I be able to continue to be a part of that process for years to come.
The topic for 2011/2012 Resolved: The United States Federal Government should substantially increase its exploration and/or development of space beyond the Earth’s mesosphere.
The kids cutting their debate teeth at the Grand Rapids Debate Metro League where they ended with and even win/loss record. Pretty good for novices with no varsity team ahead of them to teach them.
Our merry band of novices
