Ha! Gotcha! I'm not engaged in the ring-and-relationship way like I'm sure many of you thought! Rather, I'm civically engaged... if that's a real thing. Okay, okay... let me explain! One of The Washington Center's pillars is "Civic Engagement," and all students are required to partake in a project throughout the semester that fosters awareness of an issue and encourages the student to take action towards that issue. Education has always been super important to me; my Girl Scout Gold Award project was a literacy awareness project which I geared towards an elementary school in Camden, New Jersey (an underprivileged, urban area near my hometown). That passion and my recent debating at Monmouth University led me to undertake a civic engagement project working with the Urban Debate League of Washington, D.C. as a judge and mentor for middle school and high school student debaters.

And So It Begins

The first step of the Civic Engagement project is becoming well-versed on the issue you wish to confront with your project. In my case, I know that there is a large gap in graduation rates in urban versus suburban areas, and the New York Times reported in 2009 that the high school graduation rate in the nation's 50 largest cities was only 53 percent. 53 percent!! Compare this to the 71 percent graduation rate in suburban areas.

Since I heard about these graduation rate statistics, they've bothered me. TWC provides the perfect opportunity for students to take issues like that and pursue viable action toward fixing them. I know that debate has been shown to improve public speaking, critical thinking, and active listening skills and these are all vital to a student's success in school. So, why not work with students in urban areas to build skills which may keep them in school and push them toward graduation? I, along with three other MU debaters also participating in TWC this semester, took on the Urban Debate League (UDL) as our civic engagement project. Throughout this semester, we will serve as judges at tournaments -- listening to debates, taking notes, and delivering feedback and suggestions for the students' future debates. We could also provide mentoring whenever possible. We had all actually hoped to be able to work with students outside the arena of tournaments to further develop their debate skills. We're still working on making that happen.

While the four of us are all debaters, we participate in policy debate at Monmouth. Contrarily, the UDL here holds parliamentary debate tournaments. Thus, we had to research and learn the rules and procedures of parliamentary debate. The Executive Director of D.C. Urban Debate League - Colin - sent me a link to the Middle School Public Debate Program (www.middleschooldebate.com), which he told us had all the rules and what not for debate that would hold true for the high school and middle school tournaments. He suggested we watch videos of debates on the site to familiarize ourselves with the format. I was keen on that idea, but little did I know I would spend 4 hours on a Friday night watching YouTube videos of middle and high school debaters! And let me say, it's not because I felt like I had to. I wanted to. I was so intrigued by the sheer skill and rhetoric these students whipped out when they stepped into a debate round! I actually became intimidated to act as judge... and I think I was right to be!

Metro to... where?

We scrambled out of the RAF around 8:06 a.m. on Saturday morning and headed to the metro. Colin asked me to have my gang of judges there by 9:30 a.m., so naturally I told them all it was IMPERATIVE we arrived by 9:15 a.m. (my friends all call me Mom and know I'm paranoid about getting places super early). And it was the day of the marathon so who knew how long it would take us to get there. Plus, we were taking the orange line to Minnesota Ave., and none of us had even heard of that stop, never mind been there. But, we actually wound up getting there early enough to stop for coffee. And then, we were off! Engagement, here we come!

The Tournament

As a debater myself, I know how hard it can be to debate. Well, I now think it's equally as hard to judge. See, when you're a debater you know the topic, have done research, and know the points you will address. The difficult part is coming up with arguments on the fly to clash (debate term!) with your opponent's points. As a judge, I went into rounds not knowing the topic nor what points either team was going to bring up. So, it is CRUCIAL for a judge to "flow" a debate. Flowing is when you track ALL the arguments made throughout the round, from original contentions from each side to the "clashes" with each of those contentions. After the 34-minute round, you ask the debaters to shake hands (fostering healthy competition and cooperation) and leave the room so you can deliberate. Once the door shuts behind them, cue head shake and hair pulling! You are now responsible for - in FIVE MINUTES - deciding who wins the round, writing all your feedback on a ballot, and giving each individual debater points based on their presentation. Yea. No pressure.

This, my friends, is engagement

I won't go into the process or technical debate language, but I have to say a few things I learned from judging my first tournament.

1. I had the ability to positively impact students that I interacted with. After each round, the judge critiques each side and individual debaters, telling them what was good and what could use improvement. These kids care so much about the advice... I had students writing my words down and asking me for further advice afterward! I could see in their demeanor and in their faces that they were gaining knowledge and understanding of issues and of debate skills.

2. Debate really does not only help students work through school, but inspires them to continue on after high school. I talked to a girl named Camara - a person I think I'll always remember - who astounded me in her round. She was phenomenal, and I told her so. After the round, I talked to her about her aspirations after high school. She told me she wants to go to Northwestern! And she's been working hard to get there. I commended her and encouraged her. I see big things in this girl's future, and I honestly hope we never meet in a courtroom or such because I'd actually fear for my ability to debate her!

This experience is, I think - I hope - what the civic engagement project is all about. I was not only helping students, but I think they helped me. It was tough to make decisions, to pick one side over the other. Some debates were super close and I honestly struggled through the analytics of the round. But at the end of the day, I think whether they won or lost, the experience that students gain from debating teaches them enough that wins and losses don't matter... that stuff is just icing on the cake! As for me, I have made it a goal this semester to be more decisive and think through decisions more thoroughly. This DEFINITELY helped with that! I can't wait to judge my second tournament this coming weekend.