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.

UT Tyler Debate to compete at NPDA National Tournament

While sports teams have their playoffs that drag out for several weeks at a time, debate teams only have one big culmination of their entire year.  For UT Tyler, we compete at two separate national tournaments that offer us a chance to win big against other colleges across the country.  From March 21^st until March 23^rd, UT Tyler Debaters Dallas Flick, Carver Hodgkiss, Steven Hullum, Kaleb Drake, Samuel Cook, and Kaitlyn Bull will compete against over 150 other teams at the National ParliamentaryDebate Association’s (NPDA) National Tournament hosted by Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Prior to competing at NPDA, the team will compete at the National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence (NPTE), also hosted by NAU.  You will be able to find Dallas’s blog explaining that tournament soon if it is not already available.

There are a couple of differences between the two tournaments.  The first is the topics that are debated. At the NPTE, every single topic of debate is announced beforehand.  In fact, we are already deep into research and preparation for those topics as we speak.  At NPDA, we have no clue what topics we will be debating and we will not find out the given topic for each round until 20 minutes before the scheduled start time. 

The second difference is the structure of the tournament.  At the NPTE, there are 6 preliminary rounds in which 2 judges will make a decision about the round.  The goal for each team is to win as many individual ballots from judges as they can in the first 6 rounds.  For example, if you win your round on a 2 to 0 decision, then you have acquired 2 ballots.  If you win your round on a 1 to 1 decision, then you only have 1 ballot.  A team has to have at least 6 ballots to advance to elimination rounds. 

After the prelim rounds, the tournament then enters into a double elimination style, where you can only lose 2 elimination rounds until you are eliminated from the tournament.  This will continue until there are only two teams left in competition.

At NPDA, there are 8 preliminary rounds with only one judge per round, so it is similar to the other tournaments that the team has attended this year.  After the 8 preliminary rounds, half of the field will advance to a partial-triple-octafinal round.  NPDA elimination rounds are single elimination, so if you lose once, then you are out of the tournament. 

The team hopes to achieve success, as we have been working hard since July to hone skills, garner knowledge, and improve as debaters. Want to monitor the teams progress at the NPTE? You can watch for UT Tyler FH, UT Tyler DH, and UT Tyler BC on each individual round to see how we are doing!

UT Tyler Debate Teams Rank among the nation’s best

Rankings were recently released of the top Parliamentary Debate Teams in the nation, and the University of Texas at Tyler had 2 teams very highly ranked.  Samuel Cook and Caitlin Bull were ranked 9^th, and Dallas Flick and Carver Hodgkiss were ranked 11^th!

UT Tyler Forensics goes to Portland, Oregon!

UT Tyler FH vs. Lewis and Clark MH

On Friday, October 4th, at 5:00 AM, the University of Texas at Tyler Debate Team pulled out of the parking lot and began a 2 hour drive to the Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, where a plane would then fly them almost 4 hours to attend the 2013 Steve Hunt Classic - a speech and debate tournament that would feature more than 40 universities from all across the country.

Debunking Debate: an explanation of what we do during the weekends

Dallas and I debating a team from Pacific University

Often times, when I tell people that I am a member of the debate team at UT Tyler, they assume that I dress up like a presidential candidate, stand behind a podium, and waive my fist passionately about a topic of importance.  However, this is not even close to what we do. Pretty soon, you are going to start seeing posts from both Dallas and myself about the tournaments that we are attending, and I figured that you would like some explanation of what we do.

Here at the University of Texas at Tyler, we compete in what is called Parliamentary Debate.  It is a form of debate in which two teams (one affirming the topic and one negating the topic) of two people engage in a discussion of a topic that is announced 20 minutes prior to the time of the debate round.  The majority of the time, the topic, or the resolution, is in the form of a policy action that a certain actor should take.  A resolution would look something like this: “The United States should take actions to significantly improve relations with Japan.”

After a resolution is announced, each team is given 20 minutes to prepare their positions.  Most of the time, our positions have already been prepared and it is just a matter of writing down all of our arguments before the 20 minutes expires.  Normally, the debate team spends several hours a day, and every weekend writing and preparing our arguments for resolutions that we think may be at a particular tournament. 

Each round lasts approximately 45 minutes, and each team gives 3 speeches, receiving an equal division of speaking time.  The first affirmative speech is allocated 7 minutes to present a “case,” which includes a statement of policy intent and a discussion of advantages to taking the policy action aforementioned. 

The next speech is given by the negative team.  The first negative is allocated 8 minutes to discuss potential disadvantages to passing the policy action from the affirmative as well as making arguments against the case that was read by the first affirmative.

Next, the second affirmative speaker has 8 minutes to answer all of the argumentation brought up by the first negative speaker.  This includes answering all of the disadvantages as well as going argument by argument, or line by line, on the arguments made against the affirmative case.

The next speech is given by the negative, and is another 8 minute speech.  The role of this speech is to condense the negative arguments into a select few in order to make it extremely easy for the judge to vote for the negative. 

This next speech is the first and only negative rebuttal.  It is only 4 minutes in length, and the role of this speech is to provide a narrative as to why the judge should vote for the negative.  Whereas the previous speech sort of does housecleaning and does more on winning the debate argument by argument, this rebuttal is to ensure that the judge receives a proper narrative as to what the disadvantages and fallacies of the affirmative case are.

The next speech is also the final speech in the round, and it is the affirmative rebuttal.  The purpose, much like that of the negative rebuttal, is to provide a narrative as to why the judge should vote for the affirmative, while also pointing out where the affirmative is winning argument by argument.  The only difference is that this speech is 5 minutes, rather than 4.

Hopefully you now have a little better idea of what it is that we do, so that when you read Dallas's upcoming blog about our first tournament, then you can understand what exactly we were doing during our tournament, and what it looked like.

If you are interested in any additional information, then I am going to provide you a couple of additional links.  First, if you are interested in looking at the tournaments that we competed in and would like to watch our progress, then click here.  To navigate that page, you simply click first on the name of the tournament, and then you click on each round you would like to see the result of.  You can also see the resolution for each round, if you are interested.  For Dallas and I, look for "UT Tyler FH." 

If you are interested in national rankings of teams, then click here.  Postings of rankings will not be up yet, but we should see them fairly soon, so keep a look out! Again, our team name is "UT Tyler FH."

Finally, if you are interested in seeing what an actual round looks like and what tournaments feel like, then feel free to watch the video below.  Be warned, it does contain some use of adult language.  Although the video is about the Kansas Debate Team, our team at UT Tyler has the same passion for what we do and the same work ethic.  To watch the video, click here.

I have also been toying with the idea of making this sort of a series where I discuss numerous different aspects of debate, like the speaking style of debate and what the community is like.  If that sounds like something you would be interested in, then let me know in the comments!

UT Tyler Honors Program, Fall 2013

This will be an exciting year for the Honors Program at The University of Texas at Tyler.  I was fortunate enough to be accepted as an Associate Student into the Honors Program, and now I will get to take part in the fantastic events that the Honors Program is holding throughout the fall semester.  Not only is this an amazing educational opportunity for all of those interested, it is also a chance to meet some of the nation’s brightest minds.

Distribution data that proves the existence
of the Bose-Einstein condensate, a
new phase of matter.

The first major event hosted by the Honors Program will be a lecture from Nobel Prize winning physicist Dr. Carl Wienman in early September of 2013.  In 2001, Dr. Wienman won the Nobel Prize in Physics, along with Eric Allin Cornell and Wolfgang Ketterle, for his work with Bose-Einstein condensate, a branch of research initiated by Albert Einstein and Satyendra Nath Bose that led to developments within particle physics and studies of superfluidity and superconductivity.  He also leads a web-based directive called PhET out of the University of Colorado, which has improved the ways in which physics, chemistry, biology, earth science, and math are taught and studied.  His lecture will be inspiring to those who are seeking a career in science, technology, engineering, and/or math.

Later in the month of September, another science-based lecturer will visit UT Tyler to discuss Forensic Pathology.  Dr. Scott Kornman, MD, works out of the Diagnostic Clinic of Longview, Texas, and will discuss his branch of scientific research and what he does within his specialized field.  Forensic Pathology is a subset of pathology that focuses on determining the cause of death of an individual via autopsy, or corpse examination.  This line of work is often dramatized by crime television shows such as CSI, even though few reveal the true intricacies of this particular field of science. 

On October 24^th, the Honors Program will co-host Global Quiz Night along with the GATE program.  A large group attended the event last year, and it was well worth the visit.  Several student groups competed against each other in quiz-bowl fashion, proving to be a challenge for all competitors.  Groups such as the 

UT Tyler Debate Team, workers from the Patriot Talon, Honors Program members, and many other groups were in the running for top prizes, and it was an exhilarating experience.  Global Quiz Night challenges students to answer questions from a variety of topics, such as global history, arts and literature, science, sports, popular culture, and many others.  Last year, the Debate Team took first prize (holla!) and will be looking for a repeat title.  Perhaps your student group will be the one to step up and win.  Attend Global Quiz Night and find out!

Finally, to wrap up the semester, the Honors Program and GATE will co-sponsor a lecture from Karen Elliot House, author of “Saudi Arabia: Its People, Past, Religion, Fault Lines--and Future.”  House is a former executive of the Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones, and is a Pulitzer Prize winner for her Middle East coverage while working for the Wall Street Journal.  Her book shines light on the mystery that is Saudi Arabia; it details the infamous domestic social structure of the country, as well as the impact the country has on global economics and diplomacy.  Her book gives a fascinating portrayal to one of the last true monarchies in the world, and her lecture will be truly fulfilling to students that wish to explore a career in international politics, diplomacy, or economics.

The fall semester for the Honors Program will be full of exciting opportunities for those involved in on-campus activities.  Be sure to see the full schedule of events for more information.  If you attend these events and enjoy the rich, educational environment, feel free to explore the option of applying for membership in the Honors Program.  If you are still a high school student looking to enroll at The University of Texas at Tyler, consider the possibility of starting your freshman year as an Honors Student!

UT Tyler Debate 2013-2014 Season Preview

At this point Carver has already given you some details about how we started the year with our debate team at the Kansas City Parliamentary Debate Cooperative.  We even gave you a preview of the awesome food that we are fortunate enough to indulge on while we travel.  Thankfully, this was only the beginning for this debate season, one that spans from the beginning of July to the end of March.  Let me explain what the highlights of this year will be, based on my past two years of experience from this team.

Honing our Skills at UT Tyler

Regardless of what activity you participate in at the University of Texas at Tyler, you will have the school’s support.  Two weeks ago I attended the Midwest Debate Cooperative with the rest of the UT Tyler debate team and participated in a week long camp aimed at improving our abilities in debate.  The camp was held at Kansas City Kansas Community College in Kansas City, Kansas, where we had a most excellent time.

You have probably already read from Dallas about how awesome all of the restaurants we ate at were, so I will spare you of the jealousy I would create by mentioning Oklahoma Joe’s again.  In terms of the camp, there are many things I feel are worth mentioning.

                                      Above you can see the building that we spent our week in

The UT Tyler Debate Team Food Tour: Kansas City, Missouri

The UT Tyler Parliamentary Debate Team (the nerdy thing that Carver and I are a part of) consists of a group of hardworking students, constantly pushing to improve our craft and be successful in the national circuit in which we compete.  With the amount of dedication we give to the event, we often feel we deserve a reward, generally in the form of ridiculously good culinary experiences.  We travel to various places in the US, such as Kansas City, St. Louis, San Diego, Portland, and many others, and they all have different restaurants with amazing food for us to try. After each tournament, I will dedicate a blog post to detailing the food tours from various cities.  The first city is Kansas City, Missouri.

From July 7^th to the 13^th, our debate team took part in the Midwest Parliamentary Debate Cooperative, hosted by UT Tyler’s own Patrick Muenks.  If you do not know, Kansas City sports a huge array of restaurants that specialize in different things, all of which are worth trying at least once.  Preferably, however, they should be enjoyed multiple times.

Our first stop was Arthur Bryant’s, one of the original joints to make Kansas City famous for its BBQ.  Known to be the “King of Ribs” in Kansas City, Arthur Bryant’s has become one of most nationally recognized restaurants for BBQ enthusiasts.  Renowned author Calvin Trillin called it “…the single best restaurant in the world…” A bold statement, but perhaps accurate to what it offers its customers.  There is even an episode of Food Wars dedicated to the ribs at Arthur Bryant's.  I personally had the burnt ends the first night I was in Kansas City, and they were outrageously delicious.  Definitely, a good start to the KC debate team food tour.  

Chicken Spiedini with
Garozzo and Diabolo Sauce

The next night, we decided to go for Italian food, another famous genre of food in Kansas City.  The best restaurant in town for Italian is Garozzo’s, located in the Columbus Park neighborhood in Kansas City.  The restaurant carries with it a feeling that Frank Sinatra hangs out with the staff, showing the Italian heritage of both the restaurant and the entire neighborhood.  Their chicken Spiedini dish is well known to culinary enthusiasts, which the prestigious Zagat National Restaurant Survey called …”among the best dishes in town.”  This place is a regular stopping point for the UT Tyler debate team every time we visit the city.

Gates' Spicy Sausage

The next restaurant on the food tour is Gates, another famous barbecue joint in Kansas City.  Out of all the restaurants we visited, this place definitely provides the best service to its customers.  The moment you walk in the door, counter personnel call for your order, even if a dozen other people are in front of you.  They receive special training with the cooks and other workers to keep track of each order without missing a beat.  The only thing more impressive than the service is the spicy sausage, the burnt ends, and the ridiculously good barbecue sauces they offer.  Another must have for the Kansas City barbecue tour.

Oklahoma Joe's Burnt Ends
 and Beef Brisket Plate

Out of all of the food joints in Kansas City, top prize goes to Oklahoma Joe’s.  There is often a debate over which barbecue joint reigns supreme in Kansas City, but OK Joes is the undisputed champion of consistently strong barbecue goodness.  Famous for their ribs, burnt ends, and beef brisket, Oklahoma Joe’s makes the other barbecue restaurants in the city seem obsolete.  You do not have to take my word for it either.  Anthony Bourdain, host of the Travel Channel’s No Reservations, named Oklahoma Joe’s one of the 13 places you should eat at before you die.  It is the recipient of dozens of national barbecue awards, and barbecue fanatics consider it across the entire country.  Watch them make the burnt ends here; it is amazing!

Kansas City is obviously a favorite tournament location for the UT Tyler debate team, because the food spread is phenomenal.  Next trip to KC will be in September, and these places will hopefully be revisited! 

Debate Team!

My first vlog! with the help of Megan!

Enjoy!

Debate Team at UT Tyler....

            I was reading the news on the UT Tyler homepage and I wanted to blog about the debate team because not many people actually read the news. It has been stated that The University of Texas at Tyler's debate team has achieved a new national record for most wins in a season.
         The team will travel to Colorado next month to compete for the national championship. Other current members are Addison Gribbin of Ennis and Michael Jones of Paris. So I just wanted to let the debate team know that they are doing an awesome job and to keep up the good work.

I wish you success in the championship I know you will make your school proud!

UT Tyler's Debate Team sets national record!!!!

        Congratulations to the UT Tyler's debate team. The University of Texas at Tyler debate team has achieved a new national record for most wins in a season, Dr. Dennis Cali, Department of Communication chair, announced.
       The UT Tyler team of Alex Warren of Tyler, a junior economics major, and Travis Smith of Palestine, a junior political science and communication major, achieved the record while placing in the top three teams at the Point Loma Nazarene University debate tournament in San Diego, California.
Warren and Smith accumulated 71 wins in preliminary debates, which is the most by any team in the history of parliamentary debate.
         The previous record, set in 2008 by Washburn University, was 67.
         “What makes this record special is that Alex and Travis did this while maintaining one of the best win-loss percentages in the country,” said Dr. Charles Walts, director of forensics and assistant professor of communication.
          Warren and Smith finished the regular season with an 80 percent win-loss percentage.
The team will travel to Colorado next month to compete for the national championship. Other current members are Addison Gribbin of Ennis and Michael Jones of Paris.
More information will be available in the future....