Women and American Politics
Debate Guidelines
In order that students develop their skills in analyzing political issues, making political judgments, and assessing others' arguments, this class requires that everyone participate in a debate on a topic of public policy. The debates will occur at the end of the semester.
Student Roles:
Each student will participate in a debate. The debates will be contests between two teams, one team defending the "Affirmative" and the other team defending the "Negative" position on one resolution.
Each student will serve as a "judge" for another debate.
Each student will write a paper, based on her or his speech, complete with a full and extensive bibliography.
Topics:
Each group will come up with the specific wordings of the debate resolutions. In general, resolutions will have this form:
Resolved: That the United States / Minnesota should adopt _________ (insert proposed policy change).
Some examples:
Resolved: That the United States should ban single-sex marriages.
Resolved: That the state of Minnesota should abolish affirmative action in state agencies.
Resolved: That the state of Minnesota should institute
single-sex public high school education.
In-Class Debate Format:
Each team will have a first and second speaker; and each will be allowed to speak for 10 minutes. The speeches will proceed in the following order:
First Affirmative Speaker: Will discuss the present situation for women and the need for a change in policy; and outline the affirmative plan for change.
First Negative Speaker: Will challenge the arguments presented by the Affirmative Speaker, especially about the need for change.
Second Affirmative Speaker: Will explain how the proposed plan for change will be of benefit to women, and address the arguments raised by the First Negative Speaker.
Second Negative Speaker: Will point to problems with the policy for change suggested by the Second Affirmative Speaker.
Rebuttals -Each side will have a chance to summarize the strongest points of their team's arguments.
When necessary, the judges will also be allowed
to ask a few questions of each side (to clear up confusion, raise questions
not addressed in debate, etc).
Preparation:
In preparing for debates, students will read carefully about their topics. Be sure to read about both sides of the argument. It will be much easier to challenge the other team's assertions if you are already familiar with their arguments and reasoning behind them. In class, we will meet take time to work out the final wording of each resolution and to assign positions (if necessary). (Note: students are likely to end up speaking for a position that is not entirely their own.)
Students will continue to collect evidence, to think through their arguments, and to prepare their team's case for their side of the resolution.
Ballots for the judges will be distributed to the class, and specific judging assignments made.STUDENTS MUST ATTEND BOTH OF THE DEBATES. Judges will fill in a ballot to indicate who they think won the debate. They will evaluate individual speakers using the following criteria: the logic of the arguments, the analysis the speaker uses, the evidence presented, the organization of the speech, and how persuasively a speaker presented his or her views.
After the debates, students will submit their papers, based upon their speeches and research, and a bibliography.
Timetable:
April 2nd: As a class, we will finalize 2 different debate resolutions. Ideally, these two debate resolutions will examine public policy issues in different areas (i.e. educational policy, employment policy, reproductive rights and health policy, family policy). In addition, each policy group should select negative and affirmative speakers.
May 2nd – May 7th: Debates in class. Judges' ballots are due at the class meeting after each debate.