Last weekend, Union University’s debate team won the IPDA National Tournament, which was hosted virtually with over 62 schools and 132 teams competing.
Rebekah Whitaker is the director of the debate team and the assistant professor of communication arts at Union. This is her second year coaching Union’s debate team. However, this was her first appearance as the coach at Nationals, since last year they were canceled due to COVID-19.
Several individuals such as Steven Errico and Josh Johnson placed and won awards in the national tournament. Errico and Johnson were the first-place team and won first and third-place speakers, respectively. Jack McDonnell won first-place novice speaker, which is a division with students who have not competed in high school. Caleb Atkins won first place in the professional division, which includes coaches.
“The professional division is full of veteran competitors who have trounced me on many occasions in the past, so I couldn’t help but think ‘this has been fun, but this is as far as I’m going to make it’ with each new round I entered,” said Atkins, junior computer science major. “The team was incredibly supportive throughout the whole process and made sure I was prepared for every round before I went in, so the victory is just as much mine as theirs.”
The debate team faced some unique challenges due to the digital nature of the tournament, including more competitors than usual and some connection issues. A large thunderstorm hit Jackson on Friday during the third virtual round of debate. Union lost all power and Wi-Fi for a time.
“Students quickly hopped on their hot spots (many sharing them), and debated in the dark,” Whitaker said. “Some students couldn’t get connected to any internet, so they had to forfeit their rounds, but we still were abundantly excellence-driven.”
They finished the season with first place overall in the season-long sweepstakes and with many season-long awards, including first place in the novice category by Katherine Anne Thierfelder and first place by the novice squad as a whole. The whole team won first place for the Scholastic and Founders Awards as well.
“The team worked so hard completing 300 practice rounds to prepare for the tournaments this year. Yes, 300. It is incredibly rewarding to see their hard work pay off after a long, weird year,” said Whitaker. “I am simply blessed to be walking alongside them/guiding them as they do the heavy lifting. And now, I get to plan how we are going to continue that trajectory next year and beyond.”
