Turning the tides: Don’t let the growing wave of World Schools change it

If you’re a debater that just started World Schools, you aren’t alone. Within my school, World Schools membership has nearly tripled, and my school isn’t alone in the trend. In 2021 during the Texas Forensics Association’s state tournament, there were 41 entries in World Schools. This year, there were 59. 
Although World Schools is predominantly popular in Texas, other states are beginning to include it. The top 100 students nationwide in World Schools come from approximately 10 states, and the 2023-24 World Schools Debate Education Program includes members from 14 states. Team USA’s recent international win at the highly prestigious World Schools Debate Championship in Vietnam has also brought more enthusiasm towards World Schools Debate. 

However, World Schools has long been revered for its accessibility. The lack of technicality necessary in World Schools Debate while using a conventional speech structure makes it attainable for schools without the resources to build debate programs by hiring coaches. However, I’m afraid that the rise of World Schools may push it further to a policy-esque style that could jeopardize its accessibility to potential debaters and audience members. 

The inception of Public Forum Debate

My concern about potential changes in World Schools Debate arises from the necessity for change in Public Forum (PF) Debate and whether PF merely reflects the future for World Schools. 

In order to talk about PF, it is first important to understand its predecessor: Policy Debate (CX). CX, which began in the 1970s, consisted of two teams with two debaters. The affirmative team would propose a policy while the negative team would respond to it. However as CX grew, there was a natural impetus to overwhelm opponents with as many arguments and supporting evidence as possible. If a team dropped - or did not respond to the other side’s claim - the argument was conceded as true. In order to achieve this, teams began speaking faster and faster, a term known as “spreading”, or speed reading.  Now, most speeches in CX are between 280 and 340 words per minute (WPM). For reference, the average rate for English speakers in the US is about 150 WPM according to the National Center for Voice and Speech. Along with the speed of argumentation, the amount of evidence and critical arguments (known as Kritiks) have also increased in CX, making it more difficult for the general person to comprehend.

In order to combat its technicality, PF was invented in 2002 by CNN founder Ted Turner with the hope of creating an accessible form of debate. According to the Jesuit Review, “Turner pushed the National Forensic League to establish a new debate format that would be plain spoken and jargon-free.” The hope of PF was that any “reasonably informed member of the public could walk into a Public Forum round and be able to pick a winner”. 

The Push to Policy in Public Forum: A Case Study

However, in a span of 20 years, PF has continued to evolve to become more like policy debate. The style of debate has become more like CX since PF resolutions are written in the structure of policy resolutions which means policy-style impact calculus is more likely to win. Jacob Boehm, a blog writer in Ace Peak wrote in their story “The (Odd) History of Public Forum Debate” about PF’s rising resemblance to CX. 

“In the six years I’ve been involved with Public Forum, I’ve seen it become more like Policy first hand,” Boehm said. “Spreading has become increasingly common and crossfire has become more fast-paced. Since NSDA lifted its restriction on in-round technology, statistics tend to be accessed more quickly and in greater numbers.”

As the transition to speed seems inevitable in most forms of competitive debate (sans Congressional Debate), it becomes necessary to understand why too much inaccessibility in debate could become a bad thing. Not only does a higher barrier of entry preemptively deter potential students from entering the sport and demands programs with enough time and money to gain success, it also inherently erodes the purpose of debate. 

Debate is intended to be the epitome of free thought, but when we are bogged down by words that fly past our heads, specialized jargon and avalanches of evidence, we begin to operate within an echo-chamber that only the debate community can access. World Schools upholds the very unadulterated purpose of debate: to encourage us to think. 

The reason I, along with so many others, joined World Schools is because of its approachability regardless of where I have been within my debate career. As I’ve heard debaters speak abnormally fast in World Schools and coaches advocate towards a faster World Schools, I worry that World Schools may change for the worse. 

Where might World Schools go from here?

However, I also believe that a set of check backs may serve to prevent an inclination to more inaccessibility. For one, World Schools has long been heralded for its unique casing. Even before its introduction to the United States, World Schools uses evidence as a way to warrant arguments rather than letting it become the backbone of a speech.  Logical reasoning and intuition are far more preferable  in World Schools, the reason for which impromptu debates mandate no technology be used. Without the ability to access technology in round, debaters are urged to use their team’s reasoning ability. Secondly, the stringent ballot criteria in World Scholls is based on content (40%), style (40%) and strategy (20%). Style, particularly, is based upon a speaker’s rhetoric so understanding the speech is a crucial prerequisite. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the international nature of World Schools check backs any deviations in style. World Schools offers a forum for a diverse range of students, many of them English-As-A-Second-Language and English-As-A-Foreign-Language speakers, to utilize reasoning. This inherently means speed and jargon must be and will continue to be comprehensible.

Ultimately it is up to us to ensure World Schools retains its ability to continue to encourage critical thinking for anyone, anytime, anywhere.