by Rob Strauss
Staff Writer
The University of La Verne debate squad made a strong effort placing 10th out of 115 schools at the National Championships at Rice University in Houston, Texas, last weekend.
“It was disappointing given the students’ expectations,” said Jason Sandford, debate coach.
This was the third straight year that ULV placed 10th. It was much harder to earn the ranking this year, due to the rise in the level of competition, according to Sandford.
“It took 50 percent more to maintain that ranking,” said Sandford. “We did better, but the organization is growing very rapidly.”
Individually, the team members also made strong showings. A hybrid team, consisting of junior Bonnie Chuen and David Feldon from Johns Hopkins University, was seeded ninth but ended up losing to Colorado State University, the team tied for 17th.
“We did as well as we could reasonably expect,” said senior Josh Heydorff.
Sandford felt that the hybrid was very important in the development of his team.
“I think it was an excellent experience for the University of La Verne,” said Sandford. “It was especially important that early on we could could cooperate together.”
The ULV hybrid team made an impact earlier this year ranking third in the Western Division.
Two other teams, one consisting of junior Scott Mac Kay and Heydorff, the other made up of junior Christina Hernandez and senior Ken Lee, both finished with a record of 4-4 and were tied for 41st place. A final team, senior Shannon Hensley and sophomore Wendy Lau, placed 115th.
Despite Hensley and Lau going 2-6, they were able to beat Loyola Marymount, who was the No. 2 ranked team in Southern California.
“It is hard to get any win in nationals,” said Sandford.
Some of the topics that the teams debated were immigration, the progressive income tax, political correctness, human rights and patriotism.
Heydorff feels that the season went well as opposed to last year.
“We’ve beaten a lot of big-name schools we didn’t in the past,” said Heydorff. “We have gotten a lot more exposure.”
The squad has been invited to the Ivy League National Championships but will not be attending due to the expense of travel.
Sandford is currently looking at recruiting more students for next year. There were 14 competitors this year, but Sandford hopes to increase that number because many schools have at least 25 team members.
