Sequoyah Debate Team Spotlight
What role should the SAT play in college admissions? Should Supreme Court Justices have term limits? Should the 2026 World Cup be held in New Jersey? These are a few of the questions the Sequoyah High School’s debate team discussed at the Cal Invitational UC Berkeley Tournament, held at UC Berkeley’s campus over President’s Day weekend.
The Sequoyah High School Debate Team recently returned victorious from their tournament with members of the team making it to the quarterfinals. A flurry of feelings filled the air as the team headed to their first Worlds tournament of the year. Worlds is a format or style of debate with 3-4 rounds per day, with a combination of prepared and impromptu speaking addressing a combination of topics involving domestic policy and international affairs. Worlds-style tournaments prioritize public speaking over blunt-forced research; according to team captain Giuseppe DiMassa ’24, research is still a part of Worlds debate, but there is more emphasis on “recent argumentation and us[ing] evidence to support logical, coherent claims.”
During the school year, Sequoyah competes in a series of debate tournaments on a wide variety of topics that include cultural, political, and environmental issues. Debate is the process of structured public discourse, and arguments addressing a given topic or series of topics where there is a proposition side arguing in favor of a given topic and an opposition side arguing against it. In the fall semester, the team was run by DiMassa and Omari Averette-Phillips, the team’s debate coach. The two oversaw the team, helped lead practices, organized tournament schedules, and more. This spring, the team is run under the collective leadership of Sam Almo-Milkin ’25, Malick Deighton ’25, and Foster LippSmith ’25, who have split up the responsibilities of team captain.
Debate, like many sports, requires practice. The debate team is a primarily student-run extracurricular at Sequoyah’s high school that meets on Tuesdays and Fridays from 3:30 to 5:00 p.m. Meetings allow for a stress-free environment where students can practice their skills without the pressure of a competition.
There are a lot of elements to debate; it is an art that takes many skills to excel at. For DiMassa, argumentation is less important for debate than reading and research. “From that extracting of the important information,” he notes, “the important evidence, the important arguments, [students] are then capable of using that information and turning it into a written or spoken piece of persuasive art effectively.” Research plays a huge role in debate as it is a necessity for preparing for tournaments and practice. Emphasis on research allows for students to craft their arguments and make stronger claims grounded in evidence. Debate has proved to help students by teaching them useful skills that help across other school subjects in preparation for work later in life. Eva Famosa-Enenmoh ’27 shared that debate has allowed her to become a much more confident speaker and has helped her for her Talking Leaves.
One of the things that makes Sequoyah’s debate team so special is the students. Each person takes on different roles and works together to form a collaborative team that supports each other. The team can be chaotic at times, but ultimately provides a fun and encouraging environment allowing students to get to know one another while learning valuable skills.
The fun-filled debate meetings contain exciting practice debates and drills that help the team perform better in tournaments. Famosa-Enenmoh describes a drill the team did on heckling, a form of interruption used in debate, which was an exciting way to improve your students’ off-the-cuff speaking skills. People would role-play as hecklers and presenters would practice staying focused and professional while delivering their speeches. Famosa-Enenmoh explains that the goal of the exercise was to “just get through the speech without stopping and whatnot, or responding to the hecklers. Or, if you did respond to the heckles, you would take it into account and strengthen your argument.”
For DiMassa, debate is “an opportunity to meet thousands of other really bright engaged high schoolers who are interested in public policy and political science, international affairs, and economics, and to have substantive discussions about the most pressing issues.” Debate is a great way to connect with your peers and meet individuals from other schools who are interested in discussing the same topics as you.