by Patrick McDonald | Sep 27, 2023 | Cross Examination, Lincoln-Douglas, Team Policy
Source for cover image is Pixabay.com. When I competed in the NCFCA, my cross-examination style was fairly typical: I would try to ask targeted questions about aspects of my opponent’s case that I considered relatively weak. My thought process was simply that, so long...
by D. J. Mendenhall | Sep 18, 2023 | Lincoln-Douglas
Credit: Megapixl My mom always told me growing up that you had to learn to follow the rules before you could learn to break them, and this is certainly true of debate. There are many customs and rules that should be followed by the vast majority of debaters but can be...
by Marc Davis | Aug 16, 2023 | Announcements, Ethos Info, Lincoln-Douglas, NCFCA, Stoa, Team Policy
After many, many long hours and dedicated work from 25 different people, the full lineup of preseason sourcebooks are available to purchase. Remember if you’re a member of Ethos Legends, you get a 10% discount on all Ethos products! This is my first large...
by Patrick McDonald | May 9, 2023 | Lincoln-Douglas, Strategy, Theory
I will begin this article with a brief disclaimer: I have no definitive answer to this quandary. The purpose of this article is not to persuade you of a response to the question in the title but instead to raise the question. It is a topic of significant importance...
by D. J. Mendenhall | Apr 22, 2023 | Concept Analysis, DebateSmart, Lincoln-Douglas, Research Tips, Uncategorized
If you have been on the internet much at all recently, you have probably heard of the new AI, Chat GPT. It’s known for being able to produce text that follows remarkably specific criteria in a matter of seconds based on prompts that anyone could write, such as “write...
by D. J. Mendenhall | Mar 23, 2023 | Ethics Bowl, Lincoln-Douglas, Research Tips, Strategy, Uncategorized
Back in 2013, before I had ever done any speech and debate, and when my family was first considering joining the NCFCA, we had a meeting with the founder of the club we were going to join. During this meeting she went over lots of things concerning how debate works,...
