Aug 30, 2023 At 12:53 PM EDT
The World Schools Debating Championships event is not affiliated with the National Association for Urban Debate Leagues.
This summer, the country watched as Simone Biles returned to gymnastics competition, making history once again with her eighth all-around national title. They also watched fan-favorite track star Sha'Carri Richardson win the 100-meter world championship in Hungary after a heartbreaking Olympics disqualification two summers ago due to a failed drug test.
These, and many other athletes, gained media attention for their accomplishments as they stood proudly on podiums and wrapped themselves in an American flag. But last month, the United States gained another impressive victory on an international stage.
On July 27, the U.S. national debate team won the World Schools Debating Championships in Hanoi, Vietnam, the first championship win for the American team in nearly 30 years.
"As Americans, we had not won the World Schools Debating Championship since 1994," said team captain and returning team member Vinayak Menon, an incoming freshman at Princeton University. "It was a pretty long drought for us, and we wanted to bring a championship to the United States."
World Schools debate is an international debate style in which two three-member teams engage with prepared topics and impromptu rounds, according to the National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA).
Ollie Braden, another incoming freshman at Princeton University, said World Schools is a more conversational debate format that goes beyond just rattling off numbers and statistics—it's meant for a general audience with an average understanding of the topic.
"You get to see how other people think about issues that exist in the world and get new perspectives and new ways of evaluating why problems exist and what we should do to solve them," they said.
Team USA beat out 64 countries in the bracket-style tournament, including Slovenia, Ireland, India and defending world champions Hong Kong. In the final round, the U.S. took on North American neighbor and top-seeded Canada in a debate about whether a world ruled by a benevolent AI program would reduce global suffering.
The team said their strategy going into the tournament was to take things one round at a time and focus on what they did well and what they could improve, and not worry too much about the other teams.
"You've got to treat [debate tournaments] like a marathon, not a sprint," Menon said. "I think that level of collaboration and connection as a team really helped us push through and stay strong in all those rounds."
This year also saw the return of in-person competition at the World Schools Debating Championships for the first time in two years due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Ambika Grover, an incoming freshman at Harvard University, said there was an added pressure to perform well amid the live cheering of a crowd. She said there was a "tangible, electrifying effect" walking into a room full of people as opposed to jumping on a Zoom call and seeing squares of faces on a screen.
"Seeing a room packed with people who are there to listen to you, to your team, seeing your coaches in the corner of your eye—it's just this immersive experience that really makes you feel like, 'Wow, I'm part of something that's really important,'" she said.
For co-head coaches and debate power couple Aaron and Cindi Timmons, this win felt a little sweeter as they are ending their decadelong tenure with Team USA with a championship.
"We decided 10 years was a good commitment," Cindi Timmons told Newsweek. "So it was particularly heartwarming and nice to close this competitive chapter [with] this world championship at the end of a decade."
Aaron Timmons is the director of debate at Greenhill School in Dallas and in 2000, he was named one of the "top debate coaches of the 20th century" by the NSDA. Cindi Timmons is a former public school debate coach and currently serves as the executive director of the Dallas Urban Debate Alliance. They are both members of the NSDA and Texas Forensic Association Halls of Fame. Cindi also serves as Team USA's manager—overseeing everything from logos and team swag to travel arrangements and "everything you think that's needed outside of the coaching," she said.
Eleven years ago, they were asked to work with the national team after the NSDA took over running the program. Aaron said placing the team under the direction of the NSDA set the team up for more competitive success by providing better resources and a chance of "a real representation of students that make up debate in the United States."
They began their Team USA coaching journey with the 2013-2014 school year at a time when World Schools was not yet a popular form of debate in the U.S. This is now no longer the case. When they began coaching, they had to teach their debaters about the World Schools style. Now, every member of the team has debated in World Schools, as well as other formats.
The 2022-2023 U.S. national debate team was made up of 12 students from across the country. Once the national team was selected, only five debaters, with an alternate, were chosen by both coaches and their teammates to represent their country in the World Schools Championships.
"From the beginning, we thought this team had some pretty unique skill sets and experiences," Cindi Timmons said. "They were also really close personally, good friends that congealed as a team and worked beautifully in impromptu prep. They're very dedicated, committed and they did it."
The debaters said Aaron and Cindi acted as a second set of parents, supervising them on trips and helping them through the entire competition process. The goal of the team was not just to win but to create a family.
Menon recalls Cindi Timmons telling him that the coaching staff was not looking for the best debaters but rather good debaters who can work collaboratively on a team.
"That's the kind of spirit that they bring to this team," he said. "They create this culture that we have to work together in order for us to be successful, and I think that culture is a big reason as to why we were able to be successful at this tournament. All of us were able to lean on each other."
Leading up to the championship tournament, Team USA participated in several domestic and international debate events, including a training in Mexico City, a competition in Singapore, sparring rounds with the Hungarian team and a competition with U.S. teams at Harvard.
The group of students came from different states and leagues and had different skills and approaches. They needed time to blend their styles and learn from each other to form a cohesive team.
When they scrimmaged against other teams, the debaters would switch pairings and speaker positions so that they all had the opportunity to debate with everyone. This not only created a well-rounded team, but well-rounded individual debaters.
In debate rounds, so much is out of debaters' control and left up to luck and circumstance. The two things this team could control was their spirit and connection, which eased some stress during the competition.
"We learn from each other, and we are able to pick up different skills and try to incorporate them in ourselves," Grover said. "We could really rely on each other [and] we didn't have to worry about keeping one person locked in all the time or relying overly heavily on one person's knowledge base."
Competing against dozens of teams from other countries throughout the year also helped prepare Team USA for what international debate is like. It exposed them to a diversity of motions across different topic areas and the different levels of background and expertise that other debates bring to the table.
A major part of World Schools debate is putting oneself in the shoes of one's opponent and being open to ideologies different from those present within one's home country. The issues debated in rounds cannot be discussed solely through statistics and data. There is a human aspect and historical context to be taken into consideration. As Chelsea Hu, a rising senior at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, said, "You can present a statistic, but that will never encompass the gravity or the magnitude of the issue at hand."
Braden said as Americans, the debaters have to step away from the "U.S.-centric education" they receive in school and approach problems with a broader international perspective.
"You do have to be mindful, internationally, that even though we haven't won [the championship] in a while, we are coming from a country with an incredible amount of wealth and privilege and power," Braden said. "We had to make a conscious effort to take ourselves out of that mindset and look at [the debate topics] as a world issue that affects everyone. And we need to talk about what role the United States plays in this problem, but also other countries [and] how people are going to think about it."
Team USA hopes that this victory abroad will have a sort of trickle-down effect to help intensify the spread of World Schools debate in the United States. The coaches said the debaters' complete control of civil discourse and respect for opponents with different viewpoints illustrate what debate is really about.
"[Debate] gives students the opportunity and a voice to share a perspective about world issues," Aaron Timmons said. "You have to listen to the other side, you have to understand and figure out ways to engage critical points of the opposition. You want to figure out where you agree, but even nuances about disagreements on the way we do things is something that debate does better than any activity that I've found."
There is a motto that Cindi Timmons shared with her debaters that has stuck with all of them: "Very few people in their life get to do what they love for their country."
"To do what you love for your country and then win the world championship is just such an awesome, profound, meaningful experience," she told Newsweek.
The debaters on Team USA are used to competing at high levels for debate. But representing their country on an international stage meant the pressure was on. It's one thing to debate for one's high school, but it's something entirely different to debate with the American flag draped over the table.
"It was something that we've devoted so much of ourselves to, and so being able to now call yourself a part of Team USA, even if it's for something that isn't necessarily as high-profile as Olympic sports, was just really special," Grover said. "There's this sense of pride every time you see 'Team USA' and knowing that you're a piece of that motivates you to want to work harder and to be the best you can, knowing that you have a whole country behind you that wants you to succeed."
Being on the grand finale stage and hearing Team USA announced as the winner, she added, "was just absolutely magical because we knew we'd done it and we'd done the best we could."
After 10 years of work, Cindi and Aaron Timmons can walk away from Team USA proud, knowing they have coached hundreds of debaters who have represented their country well and grown the World Schools format across the U.S. When they first started, Team USA was ranked 33rd in the world. Going into the 2022-2023 tournament, the U.S. was seeded sixth. Now as champions, they are ranked first in the world, according to the NSDA.
The 2023-2024 U.S. Team was recently announced. There are three returners from last year's team, including Chelsea Hu, who was part of the final five who competed in Vietnam. Additionally, two of the three new coaches taking over the team are Team USA alumni, another testament to the Timmons' legacy and success.
