UT Tyler Debate Ranks Top 20 in Nation

From March 16th to the 18th, 3 teams from the University of Texas at Tyler competed among the top 58 Parliamentary Debate teams in the country at the 2014 National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence. Dallas Flick and Carver Hodgkiss (UT Tyler HF), Stephen Hullum and Kaleb Drake (UT Tyler HD), and Sam Cook and Kaitlin Bull (UT Tyler BC) competed against the best of the best, ranking among the top 20 in the country.

The debates spanned over 3 days of competition.  There were 5 preliminary rounds on Sunday, March 16th, one preliminary debate on Monday, March 17th, and the debates continued until only two teams remained late Tuesday night. Within each round, there were two critics who would both award a win to one of the two teams, creating the potential to win up to 12 ballots from judges.  The goal of each team was to win enough ballots to advance to the elimination rounds.

Of the 3 teams from UT Tyler, only HF was able to win enough ballots to advance to elimination rounds.  The tournament operated on a double elimination system, so each team had to lose two rounds to be eliminated from the tournament. HF won their first two elimination rounds, beating the team that would go on to win the national championship.  The team lost their third elimination round, but would still advance to the fourth elimination round and the third day of competition.

UT Tyler HF lost their fourth elimination round, eliminating them from the tournament. However, the team still received 16th place in the nation. The team is extremely excited for this success and hopes to continue their success into next year.  This marks the end of the UT Tyler Debate season, but stay tuned next year, as the team hopes to go even further!

Interested in seeing the results yourself? Look here.

Interested in how the team performed at the National Parliamentary Debate Association's national tournament? Check out Dallas's blog.