As a member of the Department of Law and Society here at HBU, I teach a course on “Argumentation and Advocacy”. I have been putting my students through their paces with weekly assignments and presentations on argumentation strategies this semester. They will also have to debate each other at the end of the class. They are a little nervous. However…there is a select group of university students preparing for the debate of their lifetimes this week. How do I know?
As an undergraduate student I was a policy debater at Washburn University in Kansas and I competed at the National Debate Tournament (NDT). While a graduate student at the University of Iowa, I was also a member of the A. Craig Baird Debate Forum. I assisted the Iowa team with coaching and judging. I also participated in public debates for the on-campus community.
Now I am going home (so to speak)… to the NDT… at Iowa. I am representing HBU as an alumna of the forum. Yes, just so you know, I will take my stuffed Husky for a “selfie”. Continue reading
When Senator Obama was running for the nation’s highest office, his list of resume enhancers included the nebulous position of “community organizer.” Nobody really knew what the heck that meant, only that it held an air of respectability and responsibility somewhere between Jesus and the Artful Dodger. The community organizer shtick provided fodder even for Sarah Palin, who defended her time as mayor of a small Alaskan town as “sort of like being a community organizer, but with real responsibility.”