Search Term Record
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Forensics Team (WKU) |
Details |
The debate team was known at various times as the Western Debaters, Debate Squad, Intercollegiate Debate Team, Western Debate Association/Associates, Forensic Union, and the William E. Bivin Forensic Society. Since 2006, it has been the WKU Forensic Team. Competitive debate began for Western at the precursor institution, Ogden College, in the 1870s. In 1919, the Congress Debating Club was established at the Western Kentucky Normal School. Debate and oratorical skills were practiced at CDC meetings and members often participated in competitions as individuals and as part of a debate team. During World War II, scarce resources ended debating for a while, but returned in the late 1940s. Women had their own debating clubs (ex. Girls Debating Club, formed 1928) and contests (sponsored by the AAUW and SNEA), but were not prominent in debate competition in the 1930s and 1940s. They were allowed to join the Congress Debating Club and returned to competitive debate in about 1950. The debate team was administered by the English department until Speech and Theatre was separated into a new department in 1968 and became its new home. WKU first awarded debate scholarships in 1963. Speech and Theatre became Communication and Theatre in 1976. The forensics program was once again discontinued in the early 1980s, but was reestablished in December 1987 by the Regents as the William E. Bivin Forensic Society and was the "responsibility of the Department of Communication and Broadcasting." Forensics stayed with Communication when Broadcasting was moved to the School of Journalism & Broadcasting in 1999. After a decade of advocacy, Judy Woodring was able to convince the administration that a forensic team was a good investment. Between 1999 and 2003, she was able to increase the coaching staff and establish a more professionalized approach to forensic competition. Deadlines for writing drafts of speeches and performance of a piece for a coach before being scheduled to compete are two examples. In 2004, the forensics program established the Elizabeth McWhorter Harden Forensics Alumni Association, named after a 1956 graduate, former debate team member, and first woman president of the Congress Debating Club. In 2008, Forensics was separated from Communication and now reports directly to the office of the Provost. The WKU Forensics Team is unique among its competitors because it competes successfully in both speech (dubbed individual events) and debate. "Our program has won more national forensics titles in the last ten years than any other team in the country. WKU is the only team to win the American Forensic Association national title, National Forensic Association national title, NFA debate national title and the International Forensic Association title all in the same year, a benchmark the team has set six times." Ganer Newman, 2015, https://www.wku.edu/forensics/ Sources: Board of Regents meeting minutes, December 1987 Chandler, Chris, Email re: Forensic Team Context Statement, 1/15/2016 Wilson, George, Western Debate as Old as the Hill, CHH 04/21/1965 WKU Speech Program Starts Alumni Group, PCDN 07/14/2004 Wood, Willson, History of the English Department 1907-1972, UA68/6/1 http://www.wkuforensics.com/historical-archives/ |
Archives Entries |
344 |
Library Entries |
32 |
Object Entries |
1 |
Photograph Entries |
93 |
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