While some district competitions beginning Feb. 5, the Advanced Debate Team got some practice in at the left Princeton UIL invitational Meets. 

“Overall we did really well. One of our CX teams came in third place, we had a persuasive exempt speaker who came in 5th palace and our informative exempt team took first, second, and third place,” debate coach Michelle Porter said. “Unfortunately, our LD team did not place but that’s ok because they were winning rounds along the way and growing in knowledge.”

Before the meet, all three teams were prepping for the competition. 

“In class, the debaters are continuously challenging each other and having their own debate rounds to prepare for competition,” Porter said. “They are consistently giving feedback, helping each other out with their cases, and so it’s an ever-revolving teamwork.”

All the teams prepare for their debates in different ways, each focusing on different skill sets to enhance. 

“In LD Debate we debated, ‘In matters of foreign policy, the United States ought to value universal human rights over economic interests,’” sophomore Gia Singh said. “Lots of research is required and you need to know about current events because your opponent could attack you with anything going on in the world.”

To prepare for the upcoming competitions, each debater reflects back on the feedback they got during the Princeton meet to try and improve their performance.

“Our upcoming comp is districts, and so for that one, I am planning to read up a lot more on foreign news because I’m noticing that more and more of our topics have been on international issues rather than domestic,” senior Isra Mohammed said. “So I’m going to start reading foreign policy more, doing more speaking drills, and try to write less on my notecards and be able to speak more from my personal knowledge.”