On September 18-21, the UM Debate Team traveled to Atlanta, Georgia to compete in the season opening intercollegiate debate tournament hosted by George State University. One-hundred-and-sixty-seven two-person teams representing 37 universities competed across three divisions in the tournament. In the Junior Varsity Division, the team of Anna Shah and Ted Appel won four of six preliminary debates to advance into the round of 16. There, they defeated a team from Liberty University to advance into the quarterfinals, where they lost the decision to another Liberty team. Shah is a senior from Bradenton majoring in neuroscience and minoring in music, chemistry, and public health. Appel is a sophomore from Ackworth, Iowa majoring in political science and minoring in criminology and history.
Competing in the Novice Division, the UM Team of Tiffany Perez and Jiaying Li won three and lost three debates.
At Georgia State, debaters competed in policy debate sponsored by the National Debate Tournament, the Cross Examination Debate Association, and the American Debate Association. In this style of debate, the competitors work all year to prepare evidence, files, and cases on the national topic, Resolved, The United States Federal Government should establish a domestic climate policy, including at least substantially increasing restrictions on private sector emissions of greenhouse gases in the United States.
The team is coached by, Patrick Waldinger, assistant director of debate, and Oliver Brass, graduate assistant coach. David L. Steinberg directs the debate program.
The UM Debate Team is a co-curricular activity sponsored by the Communication Studies Department and the School of Communication, and a student organization recognized as UDebate. Participation is open to all full-time UM undergraduate students. Course credit is available. For more information, visit our website at http://debate.miami.edu/ and our Facebook page at University of Miami Debate Team, or contact David Steinberg at dave@miami.edu or (305) 284-5553. To support UM Debate, please visit http://debate.miami.edu/support/.
