Plugged in Policy: The East varsity debate team adapts to a virtual format

In the middle of a speech regarding the death penalty during a virtual debate tournament, varsity debate member junior Tongtong Yi was notified by the other team that his microphone wasn’t on.

Yi was embarrassed at the time, but after completing four virtual debate tournaments, he’s getting used to the learning process and technology setbacks he’ll likely endure for the rest of the season.

When the Kansas State High School Activities Association (KSHSAA) gave the green light on in-person activities back in September, debate opted to stay virtual. 

The returning varsity members weren’t surprised by this decision — they were all too accustomed to the traveling, intermixing of students and the pre and post-debate handshakes to know debate couldn’t happen in-person this year. 

“My partner Sam and I both think debating online is a lot easier because you really don’t have much else to focus on,” Yi said. “When you’re in a real tournament, you have travel time, hotels, waking up early, things like that. When you’re online, you go to your friend’s house, and it’s all a matter of doing your best.” 

Varsity debate member senior Ana-Sofia Lahovary completed a virtual debate camp through the University of California, Berkeley this summer while her fellow varsity members, Yi and juniors Sam Huntley and Ibrahim Sufi, completed one with the University of Michigan to prepare for the upcoming season and adapt early to the online format. 

Each tournament is held on Zoom or Tabroom — a platform similar to Zoom that’s sponsored by the National Speech and Debate Association. Round times have been extended by 30 minutes to allow room for technology troubles and to keep the debate tournament as on track as possible, according to Lahovary. 

“[The connection issues] can be hard,” sophomore debater Gretchen Garbe said. “Sometimes parts of speeches are lost and it’s a lot harder to communicate with the other team. We try to problem solve when this happens because a lot of the judges are parents so they don’t always know what they’re doing.”

During debate’s scheduled class hour, members of the debate board — including Yi, Lahovary and Sufi — take on the majority of the responsibility for teaching class and helping the novice and freshman debaters learn the basics of competing.

“When we’re virtual, every debate member is combined on the Webex, it’s like 30 or 40 people,” Lahovary said. “I get the perspective of teachers when they are teaching because 90% of the kids have their camera off, and it’s harder for them to communicate with us. Teaching and getting kids to participate is a lot harder.”

During hybrid, Lahovary takes the first half of the alphabet on Tuesday, and Yi and Sufi take the second half on Thursday. The board members alternate between giving class presentations and splitting up to give individual presentations, all while taking questions from the new members.

But, getting to know the new students has proven to be difficult, even as they reach the second quarter, according to Lahovary. 

The Tuesday work nights that were once a balance of social opportunities and learning as novices asked questions and got to know the advanced kids have now turned virtual, losing the social aspect — with the exception of collaborating with their debate partners.

“Our first-year members are a lot smaller of a class than we’ve had in past years,” Lahovary said. “Thankfully though, debate is easy to do, to a certain degree, online. So although not as many people signed up for it this year, we’re doing a good job at preserving through.” 

Along with helping the new debaters prepare for tournaments, the varsity debate team has been preparing for their virtual state tournament in early January. 

While the novice debaters compete in the Kansas State Debate Tournament, a non-competitive league, the Tournament of Champions (TOC) is a National Debate tournament that the East varsity debate members compete in where only the best teams in the country can qualify. In order to qualify, debaters must place high enough at select tournaments across the country. At the designated TOC-bid tournaments, debaters can receive a bid if they make it to the quarter finals, semi-finals or finals.

“[For the varsity debaters], the motivation this year is to get a bid and finally qualify,” Yi said. “Even with being virtual for the season, I wouldn’t say anyone’s motivation this year has dipped, we all know what our goals are.”