From the Northwestern Debate Society’s success at tournaments this fall and its continued efforts to recruit top high school debaters, team coach Dan Fitzmier said the tradition of NU’s debate excellence doesn’t appear to be ending.
NU debate won its first tournament of the year at Gonzaga University in September and closed out the Wayne State University Motor City Classic College Debate tournament in October. Debate Society program coordinator Luke Hill said teams of debaters also placed at tournaments held at Georgia State University, the University of Northern Iowa and the University of Kentucky. Fitzmier said the team’s performance since September has been “fantastic.”
“By the end of the year, (this season) could stack up to the best we’ve had,” he said.
NU has eight traveling teams, each consisting of two debaters. Fitzmier said NU’s top team, juniors Matt Fisher and Stephanie Spies, have consistently been ranked one of the top four teams in the country in coaches’ polls this season.
Weinberg freshman Peyton Lee said she has enjoyed the experience of college debate thus far because the competitive nature of the team has helped her improve as a debater.
“When you are competing against people who are better than you, you rise to the challenge and become better,” she said.
Hill said the team does not hold tryouts, but the reputation of NU debate is “self-selective” and all incoming freshmen have “at least two or three years of policy debate experience.”
Coaches put “a lot of time and thought into finding talent,” Fitzmier said. Due to recruitment efforts, Fitzmier said he expects next year’s incoming freshman debaters to be some of the best yet.
The Owen L. Coon Foundation Hardy Scholarships are one method NU uses to attract talented debaters, Fitzmier said. The scholarship foundation was established in 1935 by Coon, a former NU debater, in memory of his coach, Clarion Dewitt Hardy. Each year, NU awards these scholarships to two incoming freshman debaters as part of their financial aid package.
The Debate Society also attempts to bring top high school debaters to campus through an invitational debate tournament it hosts in late November for the seven best high school debate teams in the country. Additionally, each summer NU offers the Northwestern Debate Institute, a summer program for rising high school seniors.
Fisher, a Weinberg junior, said he attended the summer program in high school and worked with high school students last summer. In addition to helping the high school debaters with their cases and arguments, Fisher and his teammates spoke to them about applying to NU.
“People on the team talked to the high school students and explained to them why NU is a good fit for them and a quality institution to attend,” Fisher said.
Hill said about 75 percent of the current team attended this summer program while in high school. Lee said her decision to attend NU was based on her experience at the summer debate institute, as she had previously been unsure about debating in college.
“I discovered NU through debate,” she said. “(During the summer program) I loved the people in the group, and I fell in love with the campus. There is nowhere else I would want to debate.”
