FOUNDATIONS
Foundation l
An Unparalleled Record of Success
A Decade – And a Century – Of Champions!!!
The Northwestern University Debate Society is the oldest and most
accomplished competitive debating organization in the United States.
It boasts thirteen National Debate Tournament Championships in the
now 59 year history of that prestigious tournament. Those thirteen
championships include seven of the last twelve titles: 2005, 2003,
2002, 1999, 1998, 1995, and 1994. Over the past ten year period,
four Northwestern students have been honored as the N.D.T.’s “Top
Speaker.” The secrets of success for the modern Northwestern
University Debate Society are the same that we seek to bring to our
summer programs. Modeled on the Debate Society’s “Rogers
House” program, we aim to replicate the essential components
of our college success: high value on core argument development,
emphasis on strategies designed for the long term of the season,
and skills development that lasts for the duration of a career, not
just the length of an institute.
Foundation II
Faculty That Lead Argument, Strategy and Skill Development and Innovation into the Future!!!
At Northwestern, we seek faculty who are among those who will lead
the way in defining the issues that will shape the future of arguments
and strategies on the upcoming topic. Our goal is to put together
a group of leaders and innovators who will help to define the future
of its topic, not its past. Too many institutes, in our view, base
their strategic argument decisions in experience from outdated topics
debated in years past, not from a prospective approach to emerging
issues in contemporary literature. By contrast, our objective is
to prepare students for the arguments and strategies they will see
in the coming months, not those that our competitors have experienced
in past years. And our record speaks to that objective: year after
year, the cases and negative strategies being run consistently at
season’s end are almost always those which found their genesis
at Northwestern. Our goal is not to prepare you for August of this
year, but to make sure that you have all that you need to prepare
you for June of next year!!!
Foundation III
Small Group Instruction and Interactive Learning
Recipe for Success!!!
The Northwestern Debate Institute seeks to match the skills of faculty to
the needs of the students. Faculty members specialize in specific
areas of the topic and in particular argument and presentation skill
areas; students are given a chance to work extensively with all members
of the faculty, relative to each teacher's specialization. Thus,
rather than allowing group leaders to divide energies and thoughts
among the several strands of the topic, the Northwestern Debate Institute permits
thorough development of issues by staff members who have become experts
on particular subsections of the topic. Each phase of the curriculum
is designed with individual students in mind. Students are never
treated in a large group; we believe fundamentally that learning
happens only when students are afforded substantial opportunity to
interact oneon- one with each other and with faculty. Our faculty
is committed to provide the individual contact needed to actualize
this principle of instruction. Be it small group discussion in the
Topic Seminars or one-on-one speaking drills in the Skills Workshop,
you will find an unequalled commitment to individualized instruction
at Northwestern. To facilitate these ends, the Program offers a ratio
of one teaching faculty for every eight students. The combination
of an excellent student-teacher ratio with an emphasis on teacher
specialization, one-on-one and small group instruction, as well as
an interactive learning approach are essential components of our
proven record of success. Our college program would be nowhere without
this unique formula, and we pledge to bring it to you this summer!!!
Foundation IV
Arguments, Strategies, and Skills that Last!!!
We want you to learn a great deal about the upcoming national debate
topic, but we view the topic as a tool, not an end to itself. The
curriculum at the Northwestern Debate Institute is designed to provide skills
that can be brought to bear as the present topic evolves and as next
year's arrives. Each stage of the curriculum is designed to teach
principles that can be abstracted to many debating situations. The
Coon-Hardy Scholars emphasizes the development of mainstream arguments
on both sides of the topic. Students will leave Northwestern with
cases that are central to the topic, major core negative positions,
and case specific negative refutation blocks. Experience shows that
the best affirmative strategies begin with and evolve from the core
of the topic and the best negative strategies begin with refutation
of core affirmative assumptions. The Northwestern Debate Institute seeks to
produce high-quality arguments which students can emulate as the
topic evolves over the course of the year.
Foundation V
Coordinated Argument and Strategy Development!!!
The Northwestern Debate Institute approach addresses the shortcomings of the conventional “lab” setting
employed at most workshops. In the traditional lab system, students
work in competing groups, each of which duplicates work on the main
arteries of the topic.While some of that work is productive, students
and instructors are forced to devise strategies concerning topic
areas about which they have little or no expertise or interest. The
result is a hodgepodge of arguments that vary substantially in quality
and utility, and the useful material that is produced is often redundantly
researched and constructed. Consider an example from the Ocean Policy
topic. At the typical institute, students in each “lab” worked
on a variety of issues: the Law of the Sea Treaty, and Global Warming,
to name a few. The result is that students from each of the various
labs are left to fight over the same research material, challenged
to produce the same duplicative arguments, and find themselves, at
the end, with a plethora of repetitive strategies. By contrast, Northwestern Debate Institute
students form research teams based on the primary topic issues identified
in the topic analysis. Each research team has a faculty instructor
with background on the issue to be researched. Research teams are
responsible for exploring the affirmative possibilities and devising
a winning negative strategy against those affirmatives. Each team
makes a judgment about the strategic viability of the affirmatives
in their area and is charged, where advisable, with preparing the
affirmative side of its area. The goal of each research group is
to produce comprehensive coverage of the assigned area in high quality
block form.