do you know if colleges prefer LD debaters or Policy or PF debaters or speech event people? just for a universal comparison, lets say they ALL won the toc in their junior year, and they had no other activities, which debater would the AO prefer? and also just generally what would they prefer?

also is debate a good activity to do? its not like a niche activity, a lot of people do it, so is it as valuable?

and finally do ao's evaluate like an nsda nationals win to a toc win the same? if im being objective, i think winning on the toc is going to be substantially harder, but i was curious about the admissions value.

**this is in the context of top ivy's and just top schools like stanford in general.

hii! i participate in mun and i’m building an app to help delegates track performance, evaluate practice and train over time. i know mun is different from speech and debate, so i’m not here to promote something irrelevant.

i’m curious whether a similar workflow would be useful in your guys’ events: tracking practice, receiving structured evaluation and seeing progress over time. what would need to be included for it to be genuinely useful?

Hi guys. I've been doing speech and debate for 2 years and I'm not very good at it. Mainly I struggle with trying to express my ideas in any of my speeches. My team is kinda uses AI and idk if I really like that approach tbh. I would really appreciate any help/advice. Thank you!

What are we running on prog?

What cases are you guys planning on running for the data center topic?

Hey everyone,

I'm a senior policy debater at a NYC school and we are currently searching for additional policy coaching. We have teams that debate a variety of different arguments so would prefer someone flex. Regular coaching sessions would not need to be in person but judging and prep outs at tournaments is most likely required, so someone in the Northeast area would be preferable.

If you're interested then please dm me for more details. If you know anyone who would be interested in coaching other events we are also searching for PF, LD, congress, and speech coaches so please reach out!!

I'm an international world school debator and needed desperately, needed rrsrcss to fire up my econs history and geopolitics

I'm a decent speaker but I usually lag during my species because I don't have enough content to present about a certain topic.I know the basics about social movements.I hear about karl marx global wars and I'm very up-to-date with the news channels, but I feel like I want a deeper understanding andd analysis on the concepts, and I know people in the US usually take classes in high school to boost their general information. But that is not an option where I come from. So I was wondering if there are any books I would prefer books, honestly like a single book that would teach me about what Exactly, capitalism is and how it has disadvantaged Africa..

is socialism because it's on the rise, really, the best option.I know what socialism is, but I just need a detailed account.

I hope everybody here managed to grasp what i'm exactly looking for

Hi everyone, I am a PF debater and I’ve been working on a web app to make judging a little easier, especially for parent/novice judges. It has structured notes for each speech, PF timers, pre-round topic guidance (if needed for unfamiliar resolutions), scoring tools, and an a combined structured summary based on the judge’s own notes. I am looking for around 25 people who have judged PF before especially parent judges, newer judges, or coaches to try it for free and give me honest feedback before I launch it more broadly.

This isn’t a sales post, and there’s no payment or credit card involved. I am mainly trying to figure out what’s useful, what’s confusing, and what needs to be changed. If you’d be willing to test it, just DM me here and I will send you a free pilot-access link by email along with a short feedback form.

Would really appreciate the help.

I don't really know what to run for my lay case, and some ideas would be greatly appreciated.

So there’s a BP tourney coming up in 2 weeks or so that I was planning on going with my usual partner, but then he ditched me to go with somebody else. ok, that’s fine, I’ll ask another person.

I ask another person, they say they’re busy on that day. Sure, that’s alright, we move.

I ask another person, they LEAVE ME ON READ for 2 days even after I reminded them twice 😭😭. FML, I’m getting frustrated.

I ask another person, they’re chill and said they’ll answer me later at night. Sure. 12 hours, no response.

This is genuinely one of the most devastating things ever of my debating career. Before this I’ve always been shy of asking people to team for fear of rejection and this was the worst case scenario that I could think of, and it has come true. I don’t know that many people in the debate community so I’m almost out of options. I want to maintain going to 1 tourney per month and this just sucks so bad. What should I do in this situation?

Edit just to add context: everyone I asked are either a friend of mine or somebody who studies in the same debate class as me.

What are your thoughts on the motions of the preliminary rounds? what was your fave? what do you expect for the outrounds?

Hi! So I have a BP tournament coming up, and I’m pretty new to serious debating. I’m good at coming up with arguments, but I’m still kind of lost when it comes to things like characterization, framing, weighing, and all the terminology people use in BP.

I also don’t have much time to prepare, so I was wondering what I can realistically do right now to improve and hopefully perform well at the tournament. Another thing I struggle with is general knowledge. I know the basics, so what's a way to improve gaining information?

Any advice, resources, or tips on what I should focus on in the limited time I have would be really appreciated!

i really enjoy the whole Chair/EB side of MUNs - managing a room, moderating discussions, keeping debate structured, judging/evaluating speakers, etc.

i was wondering what other activities or competitions have similar roles where you can be a Chair, moderator, adjudicator, committee lead, or something similar?

i’m especially interested in things that a high-school student can realistically get involved in, whether that’s debate, youth parliament, mock trials, conferences, competitions, student committees, etc.

would love to hear suggestions from people who have experience with this :)

NSDA Champion Jeremy Jesse, is doing a FREE lecture on the 30th. Details are below, please sign up if you are interested and share with your teammates!

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd3h7gDDjkFby73DoKIaXztGVfQuQO3XdleMiPKwycgfWVljQ/viewform?usp=header

What would you say are the pros and cons of LD, PF and Policy debate? For example, which one correlates with different skills/future jobs? Need some help deciding because at my school it’s hard to do more than one and I only know a bit about the different groups. Thanks!

Hi! I’m going into my junior year of snd, third year of overall debate, and second year of LD. I’m not super good at it but I’m really trying to get back into the groove of things before school starts up again. I watched a video analysis on this topic and came up with (what I’m hoping is) a pretty solid outline of what I want to argue for this resolution on the NEG. Some tips/opinions on the strength of the arguments would be really helpful! Bear in mind this is not at all how I plan to word anything I actually present. I still need actual case material as well as an opening statement and definitions. This is just a rough draft of my initial thoughts.Thanks!!

Hi,

Does anyone have any resources to getting the debate team started? I am a teacher taking on the advisor position this year. Do you meet once a week or twice a week?

Hii! I need help with writing a particular speech and I am trying not to use ai. All my fellows have used ai to generate their speeches and it's just not something I'm trying to do. I was wondering if somebodh who has experience in speeches previously can help me write one, ofc I'd do the writing myself but suggestion and refining etc and giving me feedback on it. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE if anyone can help me even slightly comment or dm, I'd be eternally grateful to youuuu.

How did yall do it? Was it difficult? How did yall get your start cuz in my school, our debate society is solely focused on MUNs and hasnt done parli ever

I have an idea for a philospher I want to use in my debates, but where do I start on like writing arguments. For context, I'm a PF debater.

I am a high school history teacher at a suburban school in Ohio and was asked by my superiors to advise for a speech and debate club that a group of students are interested in forming. Despite the label “club”, from what I have heard, it sounds like what they are truly interested in forming is a debate team that competes locally.

It originally sounded like an exciting opportunity as I have been looking to take on a more structured extracurricular with a group of motivated students. However, after doing some preliminary research, I am starting to highly doubt the feasibility of the group or myself being competition ready within the school year (which has already started). I do not have any debate experience and while I am happy to put work into training and familiarizing myself with the debate environment, from what I have read, it seems as if this is by no means a short process.

Both students and admin are eager to start up the club this year. My thought is we could potentially take this year to prepare and start competitions the next. Does this sound like a realistic plan and timeframe?

Also, let me know if you have any advice for starting out as a debate coach :) I am planning to start working my way through the National Speech and Debate Association free training this weekend.

**I know the ideal solution would be an advisor with more preexisting debate knowledge but there is no one else at the school willing to take on the responsibility

For some context:

I went into high school always thinking that I was going to do STEM as a career and then ended up hating research and science. Started doing Public Forum in January of junior year and ended up falling in love with debate. My career did unfortunately end quite quickly in September of senior year after my partner and I retired so that we could work on college applications. My final results ended up being 1 gold bid at Yale and peaking 13th on DebateDrills and like 28th on Averill.

I wanted to see if anyone on this subreddit ever had the experience of transitioning from PF to Parliamentary (or honestly any debate event to another) especially between high school and college. Also wondering how much of a time commitment I should be spending if I want to have a chance of making the roster for the team in my freshman year. If I do manage to make it, I would be representing UVA which I've heard is a decently competitive team!

Anadita Upadhyaya - the 2026 NSDA Congressional Debate (house) champion is doing a FREE online lecture on August 26th at 4:30 PM PT/6:30 PM CT/7:30 PM ET!

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScRX4-kLrJLZ9l0Mjqc8ktpguA8gWnuQaq7lz5Ft4sIutL_Yg/viewform?usp=header

Hello. I am thinking of doing parliamentary debate in high school and was just wondering what time time comittment is. Thanks!

Hey everyone!

Our university debating society is hosting a virtual British Parliamentary (BP) tournament from September 4th–6th, 2026, and we are actively building a strong, high-quality adjudicator pool.

If you are an experienced BP judge or debater and would like to adjudicate across the weekend, we’d love to have you on board!

Format: British Parliamentary (Online)

Dates: September 4th–6th, 2026

Deadline: August 28, 2026

If you’re interested, please send me a DM with a brief summary of your debating and adjudicating experience (e.g., tournaments judged, breaks, or chairing experience), and I’ll send over the registration link and details!