Quitting Debate

Applying to College
1

I’m a 9th grader and after I had joined debate, it was all I did. I would work around 4 hours a day on it, 5-6 hours if prepping right before tournaments, and I loved it. It was basically my life and it’s opened up my eyes to a whole ton of societal problems that I’ve never imagined before. I also do well in debate too, as I’ve been placing in almost every tournament I’ve been to including out of state tournaments.

If you want to read a wall of text, read all of it, but the main conclusion will be labeled CONCLUSION

But as I continued doing debate, a few problems arose. I couldn’t focus enough on school work. And although I still get A’s in all of my classes, I recently got a B which in my family, is strongly looked down upon (guess my ethnicity), and although they don’t know yet, they’ve already said that if I get a B, they’d pull the plug on me going to a debate camp, which for those of you who don’t know, is almost necessary to do debate.

Another problem is my overall health, debate consistently keeps me up to the smaller hours of night, and although I’ve never liked going outside, I’ve basically stopped doing anything that involves exercise. Do I care? Not too much, but I figured that it wouldn’t do me much good if my already weak body became even frailer and collapsing randomly.

Finally, although I have a good partner, I do not like her at all. Although I debate competitively, in the end, it’s for educational value and fun, she on the other hand, criticizes me for trying to debate for fun instead of competitively and although I enjoy winning, the fun that comes out of debating itself is strongly decreased. To make matters worse, her parents are even more obsessed with our records, and they actually once told us that we weren’t allowed to run a case I made because it did worse at a varsity tournament, when in fact, it was our first time running it, and it was also our first varsity tournament too. Ironically, whenever we run our old case, we almost never win on case but off of theory which is cheap and random strategy holes. While the other case actually was much better.

CONCLUSION
Overall, should I quit debate? I’m worried that it would strongly affect the amount of things I can put on my resume, since I’ve heard that doing well in policy debate is very attractive for colleges. Outside of debate, I really have nothing else to fall back on for something to put on a resume. Thing is, I genuinely love debate and judging from my results, I can argue that I’m pretty good at it too. But it affects my schoolwork, my health, and I’m finding it harder to enjoy (though I still do).

Here’s a little pro and con list.
PROS-
I love it, I do well in it, and it looks real good on a resume
I learn a ton of stuff, philosophy, science, politics etc
The people in debate are basically family
I used to suck at speaking, but I’ve already learned now, so not much here.
Leaving debate is the same thing as leaving behind 13 friends who I truly enjoy being with, and if I leave, I’ll probably never see them again. They’d probably hate me for it too.

Cons
No rest for the wicked, or debaters who work on it for 5-6 hrs
My grades, and GPA are suffering
Because of lowered grades, I’m 99% sure I’m not going to camp, which is almost necessary to doing well next year.
My partner’s a good friend, but she’s WAY too competitive, and I can’t stand her when we’re losing a debate, and she gives up when she criticizes me all the time about it
My partner’s parents are limiting what I can do, and if I don’t do well, they make assumptions (they thought for a while that I was a creeper) and constrict my overall freedom and ability to do what , something I prize.
Although I have friends in debate, I still have friends outside of it too, so it’s not like I’m getting rid of all of my friends.

2

My son has been a successful Congressional debater for all 4 years of high school. He thinks it’s important for colleges to see that you stuck with at least one thing for all 4 years, demonstrating passion and commitment. However, it is possible to do debate without spending the amount of time on prep that you spend. If you’re doing it for the fun, and for the continuity, maybe take the emphasis off winning and thus all of the prep? I also recommend either finding another partner or changing which event you do. There are several debate events, as you know, and not all even require a partner, much less that amount of prep. In fact, that’s why my son did Congress, there was much less prep time involved! He also did Impromptu so that he would be better able to speak off the cuff, which helped a lot with Congress.

3

If you’re really worried about prep work, I suggest that you try out parliamentary debate if your district offers it. It’s a really impromptu type of debate where you get a different topic in every round and the prep is 20 min right before each round. Bascially, this type of debate is mostly based on how well you think on your feet and how logical your arguments are, and not as much emphasis on evidence itself. It’s a really fun style of debate where mainly your only prep outside of school is practicing rounds and reading a lot of current events which I don’t think would be a problem if you’re truly passionate about worldly affairs.

4

Hey man,
I feel ya. I do PF currently and used to(switched my partner) have problems with my partner. I have to say, you prep a lot more than I do, but I am guessing you do policy because i doubt you prep for 4 hours a day if you do PF. My grades and sleep have both suffered because of debate, but this is my attitude towards it. Grades are number 1 priority no matter what. If I do badly a debate tournament, that worth not failing a test or something. However, I do try to plan accordingly and balance debate and school work to the best of my ability. I feel like it will be tough this year prepping for TOCs because I also have to study for 6 other APs, so that will be rough, but in general have the attitude of grades first, then debate. In terms of sleep, I just really try to take advantages of days that I get off, also I would ask your coach if you could go to less locals because they are usually just a waste of time and energy. That way you can catch up on sleep, homework, and prep more for the bigger tournaments. I am actually curious though, what type of debate do you do?

5

Lol silly me. I didn’t read the whole post. You do policy. My b.

6

I had a similar situation with another activity. I stayed with it until the end of my junior year and I then quit. My experience with the activity along w/ my decision to quit actually ended up being the topic for my essays. If you don’t enjoy it anymore, I would stop and just do what makes you happy.

7

Take a look at Cal Newport’s “How to be a High School Superstar” on thoughts on how to find an EC that you are passionate about.

Can you limit the hours you spend on debate? It would seem that this particular group/debate method is not for you.
Could you do something like MUN that takes the same skills? Could you advocate for a community group?

8

It sounds to me like your problems with debate aren’t problems with the EC itself, but rather with managing various factors: workload, expectations, relationships with your partner and her parents. It also sounds like you mostly enjoy it and are good at it. Rather than quitting, I would urge you to look for ways to deal with the things that bother you. For instance, it sounds like your partner’s parents are way overstepping their boundaries. Can your coach help with this? My D did PF and I would talk to her partner’s mom at the beginning of the season. We’d agree on what tournaments they would both commit to, and how to fulfill judging, chaperoning and cost obligations. As a parent we never tried to micro-manage their actual cases. Another option is to switch to another type of debate that doesn’t require a partner, or reduce the number of tournaments you attend. It does sounds like the number of hours you spend prepping is excessive.

Debate is a great EC both for its own sake and also for college admissions. But you shouldn’t let it take over your life.

9

I loved debate as a high school student and at times was as obsessive as you. I enjoyed our team, but got frustrated with my partner who was not as hard working as I was. (Truth be told, we were a great team and balanced each other: my intensity and his charm.) So my take on it is not to quit, you love it, but to gain some perspective and time management skills. It is a new activity for you, so I don’t think it is wrong that you fell into it so headlong. I think it is natural and even kind of cool to fall in love with some new activity, whether it be a sport or the arts or whatever.

Do set some limits on how much time you will spend on it. Do make yourself do other things, like take a walk outside or go to the movies with friends (even if they are debate friends). You seem to be coming to an awareness on your own that balance is important.

Your obsessive partner and her helicopter parents? Can you get her to dial it back? If not can you get a new partner?Her folks are way out of line.

10

Switch to LD - no partner problems.

11

Switch to a different event. As mentioned above, LD has no partner problems and PF isn’t nearly as insane (I’m a PF captain). You could also try IEs if you want to have more fun.