The Niles North and Niles West policy debate teams have been successful programs for over a decade. Despite fluctuations in enrollment and coaching staff changes, the policy teams at both schools have consistently been competitive, winning many titles and awards at nearly every tournament they have attended. 

Feeling confident in the success these programs have achieved, students were surprised to learn that questions were being asked about the sustainability and importance of policy debate. And there were suspicions that large changes to the program were soon going to be made. 

As someone who has been on the debate team all four years, this was very shocking to learn about. Policy debate has offered unique experiences to my teammates, alumni, and me, which makes it confusing as to why the board would decide to remove it. 

What is even more confusing was this decision was made without any communication with current debaters on either team. It was left up to coaches to fill in students about questions that were being asked, who, at the time, were also unaware of what was going to happen. 

To try and have our voices heard, both North and West debaters, along with Lauren Velazquez, the head coach at North, planned on making public comments at the monthly school board meeting to advocate for the continuation of policy debate and explain why policy debate specifically is so important. 

Unfortunately, before we even got a chance to share our perspectives, we learned that a decision was made that policy debate will exist for the next two years, only available to incoming juniors and seniors, and then public forum will replace it. In addition to this, both North and West policy programs will be combined for those two years, operating under the same head coach from North. 

After thinking it over, everyone decided that speaking at the board meeting was still beneficial, even though the decision was already made. A total of seven people spoke up on behalf of policy debate, starting with Velazquez, who explained to the board that she was unaware there were any issues with the program, and the board made the choice to keep concerns hidden, rather than have discussions that could have potentially solved any problems. 

“I was told that there are concerns about our membership numbers,” Velazquez said. I did not know this was a goal. It was the district’s choice not to tell me that membership was a top goal. I thought bringing home state and national titles would be enough. But finding out it’s not, I do not have time to go back and change my past decisions.”

Ezekiel Wilson-Porter, a debater from North, spoke about the benefits of policy debate: a higher graduation rate, better grades, and practice in college research. And explained how public forum has not produced a similar result in educational benefits. 

“In 2012, researchers published a landmark study examining over 12,000 students in a Chicago public school over two years,” Wilson-Porter said. “Policy debaters were 3.1 times more likely to graduate than non-debating peers…72% of debaters graduated compared to 43% of non-debaters…there is no equivalent study of public forum because public forum has not given the results to demand a study.”

Afeefa Rahman, a debater from West, explained to the board that a combined program is impossible because the National Speech & Debate Association’s procedures govern how policy debate functions. 

Unfortunately, there was no response given to students from board members at the end of the meeting or in the following days. It’s very sad for me to see a program that I, and many others, put so much work into being dissolved. What is most upsetting, however, is how people in charge went about making this change. I hope that in the future, if such a large change is made to a certain program, students involved in that activity, at the very least, are informed before a decision is made.