Written by Mia Herz and Isa Pierry

While it may seem that Debate Team is a well established team, in reality, its success has come just from the last two years, a quite shocking fact considering that RCDS is known to be an elite private school. After the RCDS shutdown during the pandemic, the Debate Team was meeting infrequently, not attending tournaments, and having no coach. In the 2022/23 school year, now seniors, Isabel Tiburcio ‘24 and David Colin ‘24 aspired to revive the team and bring glory to the RCDS name. It began with small steps such as joining the New York Parliamentary Debate League (NYPDL) and attending their first tournament which was on Zoom February, 2023. Since then, the team has grown to around 23 members and they have hosted their first tournament on Saturday, November 4th, with 11 debaters and 7 judges from RCDS.

With the support from Mr. Kyle and Mr. Quagliaroli, Tiburcio and Colin were able to invite nine different public and private schools’ debate teams to RCDS’s campus. In total, 138 debaters gathered in the Pinkham building, ready for a packed day of high spirited debate. Each team of two competed in five rounds, arguing motions, or prompts, that ranged from profound questions of ethics to connotations of superheroes and supervillains. At the end of a 12 hour day, RCDS had successfully concluded its first in person tournament! With the Debate Team being dormant a mere two years before, hosting an entire tournament was no easy feat. However, due to Tiburcio and Colin’s dedication to the RCDS Debate program and assistance from RCDS teacher volunteers, the RCDS Debate Team accomplished its goal of participating in an in-person tournament and even inaugurated their mascot, Sid the Platypus. 

Surprisingly, this was only the first in person tournament RCDS debaters were able to attend, well not RCDS debaters… they are currently registered as the “Rye Platypuses.” Why this completely arbitrary name? RCDS Debate team has not received funding from the school and cannot be represented under the RCDS name which Colin states is devastating “for the school and makes the team less official, less spirited, and makes the debate experience less fun.” With STEM as the core focus of RCDS, many humanities programs, such as the Debate Team, often go underrepresented. The opportunities available to STEM students are far more established, creating disadvantages for students interested in humanities and public speaking. With a large demand for debate in the student body, administrators are in the process of furthering the support for the team. In the meantime, its team members are suffering, not having a coach, a proper recruitment or meeting system, or funds to attend tournaments. 

While it is unclear if and when the RCDS Debate Team will be granted funding from the school, the values of having a strong debate team are glaringly obvious. The skills developed from debate are all the skills any school would want to promote in their students: abstract and critical thinking, strong communication skills, and the ability to listen to other perspectives. These are the attributes that make up a well rounded student, and it is only through RCDS’s continuous support that the Debate Team will help enlist these values to the aspiring young adults of RCDS. When asked what the prospect of a strong debate team means to him, Colin replied that he hopes RCDS students know how to stand for a viewpoint they might not wholeheartedly believe in. Colin states that this is the only life opportunity for people to “connect all of [their] life experiences and fuse them into a case in which [they] disagree” This institutes a sense of open mindedness within students and prepares them to become citizens of an oftentimes partisan world. Regarding the future of the Debate Team, their current goals are to go to as many tournaments as possible, have a degree of official status, and receive sufficient funding from the school to ensure the continuation of the team.