CPS Hosts Policy Debate Competition.

On February 16 and 17, 2006 The College Preparatory School hosted the Fifth Annual California Round Robin for policy debate. Twelve of the top high school debate teams in the nation competed against each other for the opportunity to debate before a panel of experts in the subject of this year’s high school policy debate competition.

CPS hosts exciting national debate competition. Photo by San Yuan.

Participants in this year’s event came from as far as New Hampshire and Washington, DC, and as near as Southern California and Nevada.  The attending schools are Bellarmine College Prep (CA), Bishop Guertin (NH), College Prep (CA), Georgetown Day (DC), Glenbrook North (IL), Glenbrook South (IL), Kincaid (TX), The Meadows (NV), New Trier (IL), Notre Dame (CA), St. Augustine (CA), and St. Mark’s (TX).

The topic to be debated at this year’s competition is:
Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially decrease its authority either to detain without charge or to search without probable cause.

All teams must debate both sides of the topic.  When they are assigned the affirmative side, teams advocate a specific plan that is an example of the resolution.  On the negative, they must be prepared to counter any plan proposed by the affirmative.  Popular plans under this year’s topic include overturning the Korematsu decision, charge or release of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay, and prohibition of racial profiling.  Debate rounds on this year’s topic tend to focus on issues such as security and the war on terror, civil rights, and the political tradeoffs that occur with the implementation of controversial public policy.

Public Exhibition Debate

Thursday’s debates took place at the law firm of Reed Smith in Oakland.  Competition continued at The College Preparatory School in Oakland on Friday afternoon.  The final round, an exhibition debate by the two top teams in the competition, was held in the Buttner Auditorium at College Prep at 7:00 PM on Friday, February 17.

This final debate will be critiqued and commented on by a panel of respected experts on legal policy.  The critics are asked to discuss and assess the arguments made and are not asked to declare a winner. These experts’ comments give rise to a public conversation with the debaters and audience members about the debate itself, the debate topic, and the connections and differences between academic debate and real world policy making.

Members of the public with an interest in academic debate and/or law and public policy are welcome to attend the final round.

Expert Panelists

This year’s final round panelists include:

Derek Owens— Special Assistant United States Attorney (Criminal Division) with the United States Attorney's Office in San Francisco

Joe “Chip” Pitts— Chair of Amnesty International’s US Board, Attorney, and Lecturer at Stanford Law School. 
http://www.amnestyusa.org/about/chippitts.html

David A. Sklansky—Professor of Law at Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley.
http://www.law.berkeley.edu/faculty/profiles/facultyProfile.php?facID=4878

Previous final round panels have included experts such as UN Ambassador Richard Sklar, Dr. Amy Sands of the Center for Non-Proliferation Studies, former Assistant Secretary of Defense Dr. Hal Smith, Rod Fujita of the Environmental Defense Fund, and Paul Rogers of the San Jose Mercury News.  Panelists have commented that the debaters’ knowledge of their subject area was greater than that of many graduate students, and the debaters themselves have been thrilled to discuss the issues with experts in the field they are studying.  The final round is, according to Lexy Green, the Director of Debate at The College Preparatory School, the most exciting and educational event she has witnessed in over twenty years of debate coaching.