After incredibly successful results from their last tournament of the season, Phi Rho Pi Nationals in Denver, the EC debate team reflected on their eventful year as they prepared for the inevitable changes in their future.
“We won the Nation Championship in debate,” Francesca Bishop, director of forensics, said.
The team award was also accompanied by impressive individual results for its members.
“Abigail Watkins was third speaker in the nation,” Bishop said, ” and she took two golds and a silver and a bronze,” she said, “Andrew Escalante won the Fellowship Award and was also top speaker in the Lincoln Douglas debate.”
Such results have been the norm, rather than the happy exception this semester.
“This is one of the best seasons ever,” Bishop said, “and last year was also spectacular.”
The team’s successes have set a tone through the country for the school’s reputation.
“El Camino, as a collective, is typically well-known throughout our nation because of what we do through debate,” Frank Masi, 19, global studies major, said.
The debate team’s competitiveness has even placed them above other elite schools.
“We typically do better than teams from UCLA, Chapman, and Pepperdine,” Masi said, “It makes people realize that even though we are a community college, that we should not be seen as lesser because of that.”
Since EC is not a four-year or regarded as an prestigious school, the team is even more motivated to perfect their game.
“I think it is also because we are coming from a community college, that we need to prove that we’re not the dropouts from high school, that makes us so competitive, and typically we are incredibly competitive and we do very well at tournaments,” Masi said.
Since the team is only allowed to take approximately a dozen people to nationals, qualifying for one of these positions is triumph in itself.
“It is so competitive,” Brittany Hubble, 21, communications major, said. “There are only so may slots. Just making it to nationals is probably the most stressful part.”
While the debate team is at the height of their performance, there are concerns their trajectory could plateau.
“I think we have had the two best years, but I don’t think it’s going to last,” Bishop said.
Her worries center around maintaining the team’s performance despite changes in coaching personnel.
“Diana Crossman retired a year ago and it hasn’t been the same,” Bishop said. “We were lucky to get a part time coach to take over, and he is fabulous, but we’re not going to be able to keep him unless he gets hired full time.
“We might be able to keep him for a year, but after that, he’ll get a full time job somewhere, and we are not going to be able to keep this up. The program will have a big decline,” she added. “If you are a good coach you don’t stay part time for long. It’s really hard to find someone good.”
In addition to faculty potentially leaving, the team will also be losing some top competitors who will soon be transfering out.
“We’re losing a lot of people this year, “Bishop said. “We’re losing eight out of 12 that went to nationals. We’re only getting three people back, so we need to recruit.”
The team will be losing many of these members to good four-year schools.
“Two of our graduating members are going on a debate scholarship to Lewis and Clark, four of them got into UCLA, and one is going to debate at Cal State Long Beach,” Bishop said.
However, an opportunity for students to gain experience and potential be recruited for this coming season is right around the corner.
“We are going to be doing an intramural debate tournament between our classes on May 7,” Bishop said. “If they enjoy it and do well, we might recruit them for the team.”
When key players leave, the team is left with the task of recruiting new players to replace them.
“It’s like any sports team where they have rebuilding years,” Bishop said.
