Speech & Debate

My son has a love and passion for public speaking. What are some summer camps that provide great opportunities to help them sharpen up in these areas? We live in Cincinnati, OH, any suggestions of summer camps near us (related to speech, public speaking, debates, etc.)? Other states will be fine too. What are competitions out there that are related to speech (public speaking/ oratorical) or debates? What is the best way to get him involved? Thank you!

Does his school have a speech and debate club? If not, he can start one, but he’ll need to find a coach for it. These clubs usually participate in many tournaments. Check https://www.speechanddebate.org for more information and resources.

Thank you so much, will check the website.

Hello! I am from Cincinnati too. University of Kentucky had something like this last year. I don’t know if they are doing it again or not. https://ci.uky.edu/UKDebate/summer-camp. Also, there is a camp at Ohio state university this year. https://www.capitoldebate.com/debate-camp-locations/ohio-state-university/. Notre Dame has a camp too… https://precollege.nd.edu/courses/debate-and-public-speaking/

Another activity your son might enjoy is Buckeye Boys State. It is sponsored by the American Legion. My son did it two years ago. One of the things you can do as part of BBS is get elected to office, and there is a lot of public speaking involved in that.

Good luck!

Very helpful, these are great options. Thank you, will explore!

Here’s another good one that has potential scholarship money attached to it https://www.legion.org/scholarships/oratorical

And thought of one more https://hoosierdebate.indiana.edu/debate%20camp/

Thank you, Yucca10, I believe they do have a debate team at school. Thank you!

Super, you are awesome! Thank you for these tips! Very useful!

There are different types of debate. If you live in or near Michigan, there are excellent POLICY debate summer camps at UMich – National Debate Institute (https://michigandebate.com/) and at Michigan State – Spartan Debate Institute (https://debate.msu.edu/debate/sdi). My son attended the UM camp in Ann Arbor for two summers during high school. And he taught at the MSU Spartan Debate Institute during two summers when he was in college.

Check out https://www.vbidebate.com/ and https://capitoldebate.com/. Capitol Debate has a summer camp at Ohio State in June. They’re expensive though. The Southwest Speech & Debate Institute has a much more reasonably priced camp at ASU. http://swsdi.org/

Do you know if he has a preference for speech or debate? The two best summer camps for speech events (both interpretive and public address) are UTNIF (at the University of Texas) and George Mason University Institute of Forensics.

Also, the Stanford National Forensics Institute offers both speech and debate programs and is good for beginners.

You don’t say what grade your S is in.

Step one really is to find out whether his high school and/or the one he plans to attend has a speech and/or debate team. If it does, find out what events it competes in. Have him find out which of those seem to be of the greatest interest to him.Do this BEFORE checking out any summer camp programs.

Although it can be done, it’s very hard to participate in if your school doesn’t have a team. Speech and debate can be an incredibly time consuming EC. If you’re a good debater/speaker, it’s probable that you will miss a fair amount of school. Find out how intensively you high school competes and how much of a commitment it requires.Some high schools–including some public schools–require students to take a course before joining the team. Know what your S is getting into if he does join. Others require parents to donate a certain amount of time to the team.

If your S’s son doesn’t have a team, I’d suggest participating in some of the speaking competitions instead. One such contest is the ESU’s Shakespeare contest. https://www.esuus.org/esu/programs/shakespeare_competition/ Another is the American Legion’s Oratorical Contest. https://www.legion.org/oratorical/about There are many others.

Speech and debate is a wonderful EC–IMO, one of the best. But when my kid got involved I hadn’t a clue how much time it would take and --at our school–how money I’d end up spending on it.

Super useful! So the Stanford National Forensics Institute is more for beginners and the two others ( University of Texas and George Mason University Institute of Forensics) are more advanced? Thank you, great suggestions!

I am so grateful! Everyone’s tips and advice are so well-thought-out and extremely useful! My sincere thank you to all!

Again, you can’t figure out which camp might be good for your S without knowing what event he wants to compete in.
https://snfi.stanford.edu/# So figuring out what is available at his high school is step one.

Jonri - my son will be 8th grade next year. And yes, great suggestions, I will check what debate format his school uses.

Aida - we are hoping to explore both Speech and Debate for now, open to both but would like to choose one to pursue.

Jonri - is it only debate that has different formats and we will have to know what type their school participates in to know what kind of summer camp to join? Or does public speaking also have different formats?