Each coach hand-writes at least one major affirmative or negative position on every topic in their areas of expertise, giving each student on the Club Team exclusive access to extensive major positions on the topic that are written by coaches with proven track records of success, in addition to all the other prep produced by students. 

We aim to only accept debaters on to the Club Team who are serious about competitive success—as a result, every person on the team works hard and produces valuable prep. Instead of having 2-3 teammates that help you prep for a topic, you’ll now have 20+ teammates working in harmony and divvying up the most pressing assignments according to each person’s strengths as a researcher. 

“The best part about joining the Club Team was hands down the prep, specifically the diversity of it. The sheer number of good debaters on the team ensures that you have numerous positions from every side of the library (Util, Kritikal, Framework, Theory, etc).” –Parker Whitfill, 2017 TOC Champion, Phoenix Country Day HS ‘17

Last season our Club Team consisted of coaches and debaters from California, Arizona, Georgia, Texas, New Jersey, North Carolina, Washington D.C, and New York. Using a messaging application called Slack, the debaters and coaches on the team regularly communicated with each other about all things debate, allowing for robust organic conversation to develop where students asked questions and received real-time feedback and support throughout the season. Alumni have consistently told us this is one of the best parts of being on the team.

“I think the best thing about the Debatedrills Club Team was the community/family I was able to meet. The mix of debaters that included debaters who topped the bid list to debaters who were just trying to get their first bid really motivated me to never stop trying.”–Aisha Sheikh, 9th Place 2017 Harvard Invitational, George Ranch HS ’17

Having teammates across the country gives you the chance to have practice debates with teammates who don’t compete in the same region as you, giving you exposure to a wide variety of debate styles. This ensures that every student on our Club Team is more successful when they travel to tournaments outside their region. Each student has 2 practice rounds with a teammate at their skill level a month from September to February that are judged by coaches, allowing for optimal improvement.

“Having a lot of teammates to do practice rounds with was really helpful…It was great having constant check-ups on preparation and getting easy materials to do redos with – i.e. the rounds.” -Matthew Chen, Champion of 2018 Lexington Invitational + Strake Jesuit RR + Sunvitational RR + TFA State, Strake Jesuit HS ‘18

Each coach on the Club Team is a subject-matter expert in a different aspect of debate. Within 10 days of the topic being released, we will upload several 20-30-minute topic analyses that discuss a) what we anticipate debates to look like, b) major positions and strategies we have brainstormed, and c) a comprehensive historical analysis of the topic. Additionally, we circulate a reading list of helpful articles to get started on topic research. The coaching staff will also puts out regular topic updates where we discuss trends we are observing as the topic progresses, allowing for us to adjust our strategies as topics progress versus popular arguments.  

“The topic analysis meeting every two months were very helpful and made for very unique cases.” – Victor Luo, Arcadia HS ‘18

Lasting about an hour, every student gets a personalized 1:1 session with a coach before every tournament they attend, ensuring that they feel ready to compete. In these sessions, we synthesize all the preparation the team has, discuss strategy vs. common positions, and answer any questions the student has. 

Winning major tournaments and qualifying to the TOC requires understanding the topic at a very in-depth level and from multiple perspectives. Often doing this work alone is daunting. We assign students tasks to complete based on their strengths as a researcher. This allows us to divvy up the seemingly never-ending amount of work that needs to be done into more bite-sized pieces that allow students to simultaneously thrive in other extra-curricular activities and school while also being competitive in National Circuit LD.

We have lined down, ready to use backfiles on every generic topic that can come up in a debate round that you can think of. From impact turns to answering every theory argument to answering every common normative philosophy to dealing with all type’s of Ks to topicality, our files are superior in quality and regularly updated. These files were hand-written by the coaches and their students over the years and have won countless important rounds.

Throughout the season, we hold regular (optional) seminars for Club Team students on a variety of pertinent topics, such as how to debate specific topics, literature reviews on popular debate philosophies, debate-specific skills like learning how to research more effectively, etc. 

Navigating high school national circuit debate can be daunting, especially if you are unfamiliar with the procedures used in the community for tournament registration. We will help you through this process and show you how to register for tournaments, in addition to helping you find judges and communicating with the tournament director as necessary.

Over the last 2 years, we have had onsite or remote coaching at over 90% of octofinal and quarterfinal bid tournaments. We coordinate all logistical (e.g. flights, hotels, food) and operational (e.g. communicating with and making sure costs are evenly split) tasks required to fly coaches across the country to help our students compete at the highest level. 

From help with college applications to navigating high school, all of our coaches were high-performing students themselves and understand first-hand the rigors involved in being a successful high school debater while balancing schoolwork / other extra-curricular activities. We are constantly available via Slack to help mentor students through the inevitable ups and downs that accompany competitive debate. 

We help each student understand what their specific weaknesses are and create game-plans to attack those weaknesses relentlessly throughout the course of the season. Regular check-ins during the season help ensure students iteratively improve and have a guided, focused process. 

We provide each student customized judge ranking forms based on their individual strengths and weaknesses for all octofinal and quarterfinal bid tournaments. How a debater ranks their judges before a tournament significantly affects chances of success. Some judges are better for certain styles than others, and we’ve mastered the algorithm by which computer software’s assign judges. This allows us to strategically prefer judges we want our students to debate in front of and maximize the probability that we get judges that suit the students’ style in important debates.

“A very underrated part of joining the Club Team is getting help with your MJPs. The coaches help you do prefs strategically which both quickens the process and increases your chance of getting the judges you want in the back of the room.” – Parker Whitfill, 2017 TOC Champion, Phoenix Country Day HS ‘17