Posts Tagged ‘debate team’
Debaters compete in two national tournaments
Written by Josh Johnson
Thursday, 08 April 2010 08:06
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Trophies and Squad 1 COLOREmporia State Debate took two teams to separate national competitions where debaters placed in top national positions.

“The National Debate Tournament is an invitation only tournament with only 78 spots, and we qualified,” said Chris Loghry, junior communications major. “The road to nationals starts in September when the official season begins, and there’s no guarantee that you’ll get a spot.”

The 2010 NDT was held in Berkeley, Calif., where veteran debaters Loghry and his debate partner Kurt Fifelski, senior political science major, took 39th place.

“We come from what is probably one of the most competitive debate districts, District 3, which is roughly equivalent to the Big 12 of debate,” Loghry said. “22 of the 78 teams at the NDT were from our district.”

The other team to qualify for a national tournament was Ryan Wash, sophomore communications major, and LaToya Williams-Green, junior communications major. The pair qualified for the Cross Examination Debate Association Tournament which was an open national debate tournament with 207 teams from roughly 70 schools. This tournament was also in Berkeley. The pair placed 74th.

“The tournament may not have gone exactly as we planned, but it didn’t matter, because in that atmosphere I was so honored to be one of the top 156 debaters in the country,” Wash said. “Some of the people we debated against and lost to previously didn’t even make it to that level of competition.”

The debate team started off the season with a string of wins that helped seize their positions in the national tournaments.

“We locked up our NDT bid in the Texas Swing, which is two back to back debate tournaments in Texas over winter break,” Loghry said. “No matter what happened at the district tournament level we were going to go to nationals.”

Wash reminisced about the moment that he realized he was going to nationals.

“We didn’t actually have that many rounds, but the rounds we did have were high quality,” Wash said. “There was a lot of quiet tension the Thursday the results were coming out for nationals. I got a text from Kurt saying ‘Congratulations, you’re going to nationals.’”

James Taylor, assistant debate coach, experienced a strong sense of satisfaction from seeing ESU Debate teams represented at the national level.

“The recognition of being invited to a tournament of the top 78 teams in the nation is great,” Taylor said. “It’s been a number of years since we qualified two teams. As a coach, I was ecstatic.”

Taylor mentioned the satisfaction he received from witnessing his younger debaters go to a national tournament.

“They’ve worked really hard all year,” Taylor said. “For (Wash and Williams-Green) it will be viewed as a turning point in their debate career. To see the success and validation of their hard work made me very happy. To get those two national spots back was significant.”

 
Opinion: Debate Team Deserves Recognition
Written by ehemphill
Thursday, 25 March 2010 20:02
3 Comments

During Spring Break, while most of us were getting some much needed rest and relaxation on a beach, or in some large metropolis, the Emporia State Debate Team was hard at work, preparing for the National Debate Tournament held in Berkeley, Calif. last week.

Four of the debaters from the ESU team competed in the 78-team tournament, an impressive feat by itself. The team of Chris Loghry and Kurt Fifelski received an invitation by qualifying at the District Three tournament held in Dallas, Texas, and the team of Ryan Wash and La Toya Williams-Green received an at large bid.

Though supporting all of ESU’s extracurricular activities is important, the reason why I make such a big deal about the debate team is this– in collegiate debate, there is no such thing as Division One or Division Two, every school is included regardless of size, which means that debaters at Emporia State compete against teams from large and prestigious colleges such as Harvard, the University of Texas and pretty much any other big school you can think of.

The fact that the ESU Debate Team not only competes with teams like these, but wins against such teams on a consistent basis is simply incredible.

It seems like it would go without saying that any team competing on that level deserves recognition. It is my impression that this is not the case. The only publicity or credit I have seen for the team comes from press releases, which come few and far between.

These guys and gals work hard all year long, and fly relatively under the radar when it comes to campus-wide acknowledgment.

I realize debate is not as exciting to non-debaters as some of the spectator sports and entertainment activities on campus, but it seems to me that in order to live the most complete student life possible, it is crucial that one have a good grasp on what the University is known for and what it is good at.

Ladies and Gentlemen… Emporia State is good at debate, and has been for several years. They even won the National Championship in 1993.

My fellow opinion staffers and I are major supporters of getting involved, and I see a brilliant opportunity to get involved and show support for a highly successful facet of our student body. The debate team works hard all year to compete nationally, and they deserve respect and support from the university, just as any other extracurricular activity who shows success would.

Though this debate season is over, I encourage everyone to go to The Bulletin’s Web site and show your support. Leave a comment on the electronic version of this story to encourage the teams of Fifelski/Loghry and Wash/Williams-Green and the entire debate team in their endeavors.

If there is one thing I am sure of, it is that the most distinct advantage we have here at ESU is the incredible opportunity to create a sense of community not available at larger colleges. This sense of community will come from encouraging individuals like those on the debate team to continue to succeed in their undertakings. Everyone could use a little encouragement, even if it is from strangers, and a little bit of pride in ourselves and peers never hurt anyone.

I’m not going to debate you on it, but I truly believe the ESU debate team deserves the respect and support of the entire ESU community. If someone can convince me otherwise, they should probably be on the team.

 
ESU debate starts off with “hell of a season”
Written by Lauren Walbridge
Thursday, 15 October 2009 14:02
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Roster Sam Maurer

Roster Sam Maurer

The Emporia State debate team has started off the year with a “hell of a season, so far,” said Sam Maurer, debate director.

Kurt Fifelski and Chris Logrhy have had 26 debates and won 17 of them with one bye. LaToya Williams-Green and Ryan Wash have had 10 debates and won six and lost four.

“I feel really good about what we’ve done so far,” Maurer said, “but I fell like there’s still a lot of work that we can do.”

The squad has meetings and practices every Tuesday and Thursday from 3:30 to 5 p.m. and students can set up additional practices. Maurer says many of the varsity debaters spend anywhere from 20-40 hours a week researching and constructing arguments.

In debate, there are three divisions that students can compete in: novice, which is for students with no prior debate experience, junior varsity, which is for those with limited experience and open or varsity which is the top division.

“(Varsity) is the one we compete in primarily,” Maurer said. “We usually don’t have a lot of people just kind of walk on the squad and stick around for very long. We actively recruit kids out of high school to come in and compete on our varsity team.”

There are currently nine members of the debate team. The group has an open walk-on policy, so any full-time student is welcome to join.

Fifelski, senior social sciences major, was recruited four years ago from Grand Rapids, Mich. He said he chose ESU because the debate team was willing to work hard and often.

“I think Sam Maurer is a wonderful person,” Fifelski said. “He’s s good friend of mine, which would not be the case if he wasn’t such a good coach. He’s very understanding of people, but expects hard work at the same time and that’s pretty cool.”

Hayley Holloway-Utter, sophomore communication major, has been a member of the debate team for two years. She said that she chose ESU because of the coaches.

“I can’t justify going anywhere else because of our coaching staff,” Holloway-Utter said. “They are two of the smartest people you’d ever meet in your whole life. They let you debate how you want to debate. I really like debating theory, or how the rules of debate should be within rounds, which is not their forte, but they’ve learned a lot more about it for my benefit which I think is really cool.”

The squad travels to tournaments all over the country. So far this year, they have gone to Gonzaga University in Washington state, Kentucky, University of Northern Iowa and Kansas City Kansas Community College.

The team will host a tournament at ESU this weekend, Oct. 16-19, and have the next weekend off but will be preparing for a tournament at Harvard the weekend of Oct. 31.

“There is no Division II in debate,” Maurer said. “We don’t just debate schools that are about our size. We debate Harvard, Emory, Wakeforest, Northwestern and whoever else has got an important program.

“We take a lot of pride in going and representing our small school that maybe nobody has heard of before and once a student from Harvard loses to us, they’ll know where Emporia is on the map. They can point to it.”

Lauren Walbridge/The Bulletin