William Van Treuren and Than Hedman, part of the CU debate team, are celebrating their first national title.
Van Treuren, a 21-year-old junior math and MCD biology double major and one half of the debate team from CU-Boulder that won the National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence, said he never expected to win nationals.
“I didn’t think we were nearly prepared,” Van Treuren said. “We did not expect to do that well.”
Van Treuren and Hedman, a 21-year-old junior chemistry major, competed against 64 of the nation’s best debating teams on March 30 in Los Angeles for the title, according to a news release. They beat out the University of Oregon to win the first national title for CU debaters.
Van Treuren said the way he and Hedman prepared for the competition was by reading the news, discussing things with each other and writing arguments out.
“The questions get changed in every round in the type of debate we do,” Van Treuren said. “So preparation is limited to news, knowing what’s going on [in] world affairs and having prepared positions.”
According to the release, each round lasts approximately 50 minutes with each team alternating between arguments and rebuttals. Although the debate team is a student group and therefore doesn’t have official faculty sponsors or advisers, they did have a volunteer coach, Nathan Jeffries, a 23-year-old CU alum.
“We met every Tuesday,” Jeffries said. “We do practice debates and talk about the strategies used.”
Jeffries said he also helped Hedman and Van Treuren develop strategies during the 20 minute preparation time in between rounds.
“Will and Than are really good,” Jeffries said. “We all knew they had a very good shot at winning a national championship. You have to beat so many good teams, but it’s always kind of a surprise.”
Van Treuren said that they frequently have to debate supreme court cases. Their winning round resolution was: “The United States Supreme Court should eliminate the ‘plain view exception’ for searches of personal computers,” according to the news release.
“So the affirmative had to defend that the plain view did not exist,” Van Treuren said. “We agreed with them for the most part but said the plain view exception should not exist for child pornography. Most good debate teams will anticipate what the argument would be.”
The other team, Van Treuren said, argued that the plain view exception created a tyranny that allowed the government to create all sorts of unwarranted seizures.
“But we only read two arguments, which is very small,” Van Treuren said.
Van Treuren said that it was a combination of several factors that helped him and Hedman win.
“We hit teams that we knew that we could beat,” Van Treuren said. “We had very good judging. We had good questions. And I feel like the arguments just went our way. It was a confluence of circumstances that helped us.”
The team had to qualify for nationals, Van Treuren said. Points were earned throughout the six tournaments the team went to during the year and the top 64 were invited to nationals.
“Our teachers have been very understanding,” Van Treuren said about having to miss class for competitions. “The school has done a lot for us. But it would be nice if we could get out of classes easier. It would also be nice to put all our trophies somewhere.”
Van Treuren said he definitely plans on continuing to debate during the rest of his time at CU.
“Once you become a debater, its kind of hard to leave,” Van Treuren said. “There aren’t a lot of activities that are as intellectually stimulating. When knowledge is competitive, people are really forced to listen to you. If they don’t listen to you, they lose.”
Contact CU Independent News Budget Editor Sheila V Kumar at Sheila.kumar@colorado.edu.
