Debate team sixth in nation

By Gina Szeto
Staff Writer

In the most recent National Debate Tournament rankings, USC's oldest student organization, Annenberg School for Communication's Trojan Debate Squad ranked sixth out of 178 colleges and universities across the nation, and fifth among varsity squads, according to a press release.
This places the Trojan Debate Squad behind Emory, Michigan State, Kansas and Southern Illinois and higher than such prestigious programs as Northwestern (eighth), Mich-igan (ninth), Texas (14th), Georgetown (16th), Dartmouth (21st), Harvard (34th) and UC Berkeley (129th).
Two years ago, USC was the Collegiate National Champion and has been ranked in the top 10 ever since.
Three USC teams also qualified to compete in the 1998 National Debate Tournament, the national championship which determines the best two- person team in the nation.
The teams are composed of Roger Stetson, a sophomore majoring in international relations, and Adam Hurder, a sophomore majoring in political science, as well as Armands Revelins, a junior majoring in English, and Lindsay Harrison, a sophomore majoring in political science. They qualified by finishing first and second, respectively, at the March 25 District I qualifying tournament which advances five teams out of 200 to Nationals.
"Since every team from every college essentially argues a different case, the research burdens are quite heavy," Harrison said.
The team of Greg Bevan, a senior majoring in communications, and John Markowski, a junior majoring in political science, also qualified on the basis on their successes throughout the season.
Two of the Trojan Teams, Harrison/Revelins and Stetson/Hurder, qualified for elimination rounds at this years National Debate Tournament, where they both finished sixth in the tournament, with close decisions against Harvard University and Iowa University.
In the past year, the USC Debate team has traveled to the University of Kentucky; Wake Forest University; Long Beach State, where USC won first place; Southern Illinois University, where the team took third; Northwestern University, where USC placed fourth; San Diego State University; University of Utah, where USC took second; and the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, where USC placed first.
Collegiate teams debate one resolution for the entire year's tournaments. This year's topic is "Resolved: That the United States Federal Government should substantially increase security assistance to the following Southeast Asian nations: Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia, Cambodia, Brunei, Singapore, Thailand, Burma (Myanmar), Malaysia and the Philippines."
Every year, professors from different universities submit proposals for debate resolutions. In August, each college gets one vote to choose the resolution they want.
At each tournament, every team defends this resolution four times and negates the resolution four times. The USC Debate team also recruits high school students and "develops them into good public speakers and advocates," said David Damus, director of Forensics.
The Debate Squad also has three national high school champions; Ari Meltzer, a freshman majoring in broadcast journalism, Harrison and Revelins.