The state of college debate according to a survey of its coaches: data to ground the discussion of debate and civic engagement

ABSTRACT

In 2015, prominent figures from the debate community gathered at Penn State for a Conference on Speech and Debate as Civic Education. Convened in response to a perceived decline in debate’s contributions to civic education, the conference also aimed to start a conversation about the future of debate education. Although a great deal can be learned from anecdotal evidence about trends in debate education, surprisingly little is known about the actual activity of college debate teams across the country. For example, there are no real data about how many tournaments the average college debate team attends each year. In this essay, we present results from the first national survey of college debate coaches concerning the shape and scope of the activity. With a focus on debate’s role in civic education, we present our findings to help ground the emerging conversation about the future of debate.

KEYWORDS:

• debate
• college debate
• civic engagement
• civic education
• pedagogy
• debate coaches