Liberty Univ. debate team takes national title again

By Christa Desrets
Lynchburg News & Advance
Published: May 2, 2008

The Liberty University Debate Team celebrated the end of a championship year Thursday after claiming the American Debate Association’s national title for the fourth year running.

Until two years ago, the team was led by Brett O’Donnell, who this year resigned to work as a communications specialist for Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign.

This year, the school took the top score in the American Debate Association’s final rankings while also earning a second-place finish behind Binghamton University among rankings calculated by two other organizations, the National Debate Tournament and the Cross Examinations Debate Association.

The team this year debated on the topic of Middle East policy, and whether the United States should engage those countries, said senior captain Garrett Halydier.

From August through April, each of the team’s roughly 20 members typically spent 20 to 30 hours a week researching the topic and becoming experts on arguing both sides, said team member Michelle Oh.

At the dozen tournaments the team attends yearly, members use their research as evidence when arguing in pairs from each viewpoint.

“Debate has made my schoolwork a lot less challenging,” said Oh, noting her experience with thorough research necessary to argue a point.

The game also has a “cat and mouse” element, Hall said, since after each tournament, the evidence is made public and any team could use it for their next debate round. So the group continuously delves deeper and deeper into the yearly topic, he said.

“There’s absolutely no way to avoid taking a position that you don’t necessarily agree with when debating,” he said.

Junior debater Ross Garrett said he also encourages the team to be thorough.

Every time he finds a document to use in support of an argument, he also must find something to counter it.

His debate partner, sophomore Stephanie Dillard, said the process can be exhausting, but she doesn’t feel it during the often 14-hour days of debate during a tournament.

“It’s such an adrenaline rush,” she said.