Orientation Recap

UTK Debate
Jul 20, 2017 · 6 min read

By Caroline Rogers, Kenny Cody, Mickayla Stogsdill, Nathaniel Hooper

With only a little over a month until school starts again, many new college students are looking for ways to get involved on campus. Debate is an amazing opportunity for new students to enhance their public speaking and buff up their resume this fall.

Throwback to our first orientation this summer!

Over the summer, the Tennessee Speech and Debate Society set up a booth at each student engagement showcase during every orientation session for new, incoming students. During the hour allotted for the incoming students to peruse the vast array of student organizations, clubs, and teams, the densely crowded TRECS roared with chatter from the booths attempting to sway the incoming students to give them a visit. This night allows students to pursue their interests and learn about clubs they didn’t know existed!

Naturally, the UTK Debate team attempted to persuade nearly every passerby knowing that students with any type of background would benefit having a debate experience. In each session, incoming students from all stripes signed their names into our team’s database to receive an email regarding the date and time of our fall interest meeting. We attempted to persuade students to sign their names through stories of our four consecutive national championship seasons, the cross-applicability of debate skills and classroom skills, and the networking capability which UTK Debate affords.

A TIPDA round with alumni competing alongside student debaters from Fall 2016!

As the summer progressed, UTK Debate continually racked up more and more signatures from students of all backgrounds. Some of the incoming students who expressed interest in debate had prior competitive debate experience, but most students who signed up for an email about our interest meeting had no prior experience with debating competitively. Our team is known for doing exceptionally well within the Novice division- we’ve had two National Champion Novice debaters in the past two years! Yet the vast majority of our team joined with no formal debate experience of their own, including the national champions. Because of our lack of experience before entering, we are able to work together to develop each other as teammates who are genuinely invested in our personal and team-wide improvement. After the final orientation session on Monday, July 17, we ended the 2017 summer’s slate of showcases having amassed 411 total signatures. This total surpasses our 400-signature goal, and it is an all-time best in signatures for our team!

Reflecting upon our feats this summer, a few members of the team chose to reflect upon their favorite part of orientation:

“One of my favorite parts of orientation was the last few minutes. Most other organizations had packed up and were heading out, but the debate table still stood. There were usually one or two students left walking around, and we tried to grab their attention in this time. Most of the night were loud and busy, and it was difficult to connect with students in such a rushed environment. But when everything settled down, we had the chance to converse more intimately with the incoming freshmen who told us about their plans for the future and interest in debate. These conversations were refreshing, inspiring, and the best part of the night.” — Caroline Rogers, Treasurer

“With the school year coming up quickly, the debate team worked orientation for the duration of the summer, spanning from late May until mid-July. Since I just had joined the team this past year, this was my first hands-on experience dealing with recruiting freshman to join our program. One of my goals for this summer was to get as many people interested as humanly possible, and that did not just mean recruiting people who were already very motivated. Many of us on the team had not had any debate experience at the high school level, so we could relate when someone during orientation would tell us that they had never done anything like it before. Although we had many who were interested because they had done it in high school, our goal was to expand our horizons and broaden our appeal to fit anyone’s major, social group, or academic builder that we believe our program truly is. With over 400 signatures, we have had one of the biggest turnouts for orientation sign-ups in recent years, so this is just another sign to come that this year is going to be a successful and expectation-filled year, and we are very excited to see what it will bring us.” — Kenny Cody, Vice President

“One of the first questions I liked to ask new students was, ‘Do you have any speech or debate experience?’ For the most part, the answer was no. The best moments I had at the orientation showcases are the ones where I knew the new student liked to argue, but were worried about joining a National Championship team. Many said to me, ‘I really like to debate with my friends, but I could never do that competitively because I’m not very good.’ The vast majority of our team joined with zero formal debate experience, so it always made me smile knowing that students who want to debate feel they’re welcome to our team that is committed to promoting civil discourse regardless of educational background.” — Mickayla Stogsdill, President

“When I visited the Tennessee Speech and Debate Society’s booth at my freshmen orientation as a prospective member, I was greeted with welcoming faces who were genuinely excited to tell me all about the amenities debating at the collegiate level could provide to me. Now, as a sophomore member of the team, I became one of those who give the spiel to incoming freshmen at the University of Tennessee about the benefits of collegiate debate. When I gave incoming freshmen my pitch for joining UTK Debate, I quickly learned that the bit I was told at my orientation session was not rehearsed; it was how the members of TSDS truly felt regarding the career, classroom, and interpersonal relationship skills they had gained from being a member of UTK Debate. This experience is undoubtedly my favorite part about new student orientation. Having the opportunity to explain to freshmen who are attempting to find their niche in a large, chaotic room, in which hundreds of booths are attempting to sway them towards their organization, the benefits and increase in my personal breadth of opportunity I have received as a member of UTK Debate is an opportunity I cherish. Having the opportunity to pass along the message which sculpted the path of my collegiate extracurricular life to others was truly a pleasure.” — Nathaniel Hooper, Public Relations Chair

From the team: thank you and see you soon.

We are grateful to have the amount of interest we did, and we are hopeful to see some of these incoming new Vols join our team in the Fall!

Want to stay updated with the happenings at the Tennessee Speech and Debate Society? Follow us on Twitter and Instagram to never miss an update.

Want to join UTK Debate? Like and follow us on Facebook, and send us a message!

Want to debate but don’t go to UT? Contact us at utkdebateteam@gmail.com and we will help you find a debate team in your area (high school and up only).

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UTK Debate

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We are the official Tennessee Speech and Debate Society of the University of Tennessee #OneTeam #OneFamily #OneWin #VolsDebate

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