Hi! I just wanted to ask if anyone knew how the British Parliamentary and WSDC formats were regarded by US universities? I know that US Debate formats are considered prestigious, so will a successful debate record in international formats be equally helpful towards my chances of admission?
Thanks for the help!
Yes, they should be ‘equally helpful’…but imo (and limited but relevant experience), debate is not a heavily weighted EC, and is generally not given as much weight as it deserves.
Actually, if you get a good rank at the WSDCs, your chance of being admitted by a top college would increase a lot, given everything else is impressive as well. Placing into the top 5-10 virtually guarantees admission to (gasp) Harvard. It is a really big deal. Look up the top ten speakers from every year. Almost all of them attended either Oxford/Cambridge/Melbourne/Sydney or some top US college.
I think the value of British Parliamentary debating depends on whether the university sends teams to Worlds or not. If so, they definitely want good BP speakers, but if they only compete on the American circuit then it probably won’t be valued quite as highly.