Student Writer

January 30, 2012 - Nearly 80 years after Wiley College students traveled to Los Angeles to debate their peers from USC, the roles were reversed, but the result was the same. A standing-room only crowd of approximately 700 people was captivated by a debate of the necessity of civil disobedience.

Marshall Mayor Chris D. Paddie recognized the special evening with a proclamation recognizing the day as “University of Southern California and Wiley College Debate Teams Day.”

The original debate was groundbreaking because it was rare for students from a historically black college to compete against other programs.

The 1935 debate was the foundation for the 2007 Harpo Films production, “The Great Debaters,” starring Denzel Washington and Forest Whitaker. The success of the film played an important role in making this reunion possible. Washington’s $1 million donation to Wiley College made it possible to revive its debate program. Today, both Wiley’s The Melvin B. Tolson/Denzel Washington Forensics Society and USC’s Trojan Debate Squad are nationally recognized debate programs.

Faculty and students of the Trojan Debate Squad traveled to Marshall, Texas at the invitation of Wiley President Haywood L. Strickland and Director of Forensics Chris Medina. Medina noted that “77 years ago these two teams left the building as equals.  Tonight, that is how they enter.”

Anticipation had been building for days about the event, as Wiley alumni and guests traveled from around the country to attend. Guests included the Wiley Board of Trustees, Mayor Paddie, and Kansas State Senator David Haley.

Interest was so great that the crowd filled the Julius S. Scott Sr. Chapel and an overflow auditorium. Audiences from around the world also listened to the audio broadcast.

Dr. Joseph L. Morale, Wiley College’s Vice President for Student Affairs and Enrollment Services, presided over the event and opened the affair with an account from the 1935 USC Daily Trojan student newspaper article that chronicled the original debate.  He then recognized a special guest in the audience, Dr. Arthur Tolson, the son of the legendary Wiley professor and debate coach Dr. Melvin B. Tolson. Dr. Tolson and USC Director of Forensics Dr. Alan Nichols agreed to the original groundbreaking debate.

The debate began with Cary Chavis, Wiley’s Debate Captain (Class of ’13, Education Major) offering a strong debate of the role of civil obedience throughout history, including most notably as an essential tactic of the Civil Rights Movement. USC offered an initial reply by Maria Mohammad (Class of ’12, Engineering major) cataloging the problems between modern efforts to utilize civil disobedience to achieve social change, from the Occupy Wall Street protests to efforts to block recent health care reform.

Wiley’s Chad Mossman (Class of ’12, Business Major) provided a strong response and emphasized the importance of strong civil responses to injustices in modern times. USC’s Clara Purk (Class of ’14, International Relations and & Communication major) might have been the youngest student on stage, but captivated the crowd with a stirring defense of legal forms of civic dissent, such as those that stopped the recent internet privacy legislation and emphatic reminder that the successes of past struggles for social justice made it possible for all Americans to utilize institutional forms of dissent. Mohammad and Chavis returned to the stage for powerful rebuttals that left the crowd buzzing.

USC Director of Debate and Forensics Dr. Gordon Stables captured the spirit of the night when he noted that everyone in attendance “won the debate” because they were treated to such a fantastic display of argumentation.

Before the evening concluded, the audience had one more reason to cheer when Dr. Stables invited the Wiley team back to Los Angeles for a future debate and Dr. Morale quickly accepted.

Full photos are available at http://www.facebook.com/USCDebate

Video content will be uploaded shortly.

Thanks to Professor Chris Medina, the Wiley College students and the Wiley administration for being so inviting today. Highlights include a fantastic campus tour, seeing the statues honoring prominent Wiley individuals, including Professor Tolson, a tour of the amazing art museum owned by Eddie Ray Watson (whose art has been honored by the Obama administration), and an interview on Wiley's campus radio. Our tour included a visit to the Julius S. Scott Sr. Chapel which will host the debate tomorrow night. Tickets to the 700 seat facility are already gone and Wiley is setting up an overflow space of 400 more seats plus offering streaming audio.

Tonight we are taking part in a banquet that part of the Ethical Student Leadership Conference at Wiley and will meet the entire Wiley debate squad.

The Wiley hospitality has been fantastic and we are all very excited about the debate.

Fight On!

Directions to campus – If you are at the Radisson Hotel (3540 South Figueroa Street, Los Angeles California 90007) just walk out across Figueroa Blvd and you will on the USC campus. Please use the crosswalks as Campus police and LAPD are known to write jaywalking tickets.

If you are driving to campus, follow signs for USC off the 110 or the 10. You are looking to enter USC on W Jefferson Blvd at Gate 5. 

Parking – If you are staying at the Radisson you should park in their deck and walk to campus. It is basically the same distance from the tournament buildings to the parking lot on campus. If you drive to campus, you should enter Gate 5 (off W. Jefferson Blvd) and purchase a daily parking pass for $8.00. Enter the campus and make a left onto W 34th St. Follow it to the end and park in Parking Structure D (on your left).

Buildings in Use – The attached map lists all buildings in use. 

Day 1 (Tuesday) - We are using the Grace Ford Salvatori (GFS) building as our hub. Most open debates, the tab room, breakfast and the dinner will be served here. We also use Taper Hall (THH), SOS and Waite Phillips Hall (WPH) on Tuesday. We do not use the traditional VKC building on Tuesday.

Day 2 – (Wednesday) – We return to the VKC building as our hub. Almost all open debates will be in this building plus the tab room and breakfast will be here. We also use the close by WPH and SOS buildings. The first elim for both divisions (doubles in open and semis in JV will be in VKC).

Day 3 – (Thursday) – All debates at the Radisson on the 2nd floor. 

Meals

Breakfast - The Radisson provides breakfast each morning for guests. We will also have a light breakfast and coffee each morning.  We are also providing continental breakfast on Thursday at the Radisson.

Lunch – On day 1 we will have boxed sandwich lunches available in each tournament building.  On day 2, we have contracted with two outstanding food trucks to provide lunch. There will be tickets for Don Chow Tacos (Chinese-Mexican Fusion) http://www.donchowtacos.com/  and Mandoline Grill (Vietnamese) http://www.mandolinegrill.com/  in your entry packets.

Dinner – On Day 1, the tournament will offer a buffet from Mo-Chica, a fantastic Peruvian restaurant http://mo-chica.com/  Day 2 is traditionally a time where folks eat at different times (because of the first elim round) so we have worked with the Radisson to provide discount cards that you can use at several restaurants within walking distance.

Campus Internet – USC has an open guest wireless network for public use. 

Judging

A – Online balloting - We are using the CAT software so all ballots can be entered online.

B – Speaker points - We are utilizing a 30-point scale, accepting points in increment of one-tenth of a point. Speakers should be differentiated in each debate. There cannot be any tie within a single debate. We ask that judges not regularly award the bulk of their points at or below the ‘below average’ (27) standard or at or above the ‘very good’ (29) standard. In order for speaker points to have some sense of meaning individual judges must feel comfortable providing evaluations across the range of items. 

 C – Obligations - All judges are obligated through the octofinals on the morning of the 5th. Judges are asked to support a healthy educational environment in each debate and to provide a judgment on that debate. All debates must be decided with only one win and only one loss. The tournament will provide a judgment if the assigned judge is unwilling to complete this request. 

Elimination rounds – We will clear a full doubles in open and a semis in JV. The JV semis will take place during the doubles and the JV finals will take place during the open quarters.

Tournament Schedule
 
January 3rd – All rounds at USC 
8:00 AM    Round 1 
10:30 AM    Round 1 decision deadline 
11:00 AM    Round 2 
1:30 PM    Round 2 decision deadline 
Lunch (Provided by the tournament) 
3:00 PM    Round 3 
5:30 PM    Round 3 decision deadline 
Dinner (Provided by the tournament) 
6:30 PM    Round 4 
9:00 PM    Round 4 decision deadline 

January 4th - All Rounds at USC 

8:00 AM    Round 5 pairings released 
9:00 AM    Round 5 
11:30 AM    Round 5 decision deadline 
Lunch on campus (Provided by the tournament) 
12:30 AM    Round 6 
3:00 PM    Round 6 decision deadline 
3:30 PM    Awards Ceremony 
4:30 PM    Open Double-Octofinals and JV Semifinals 
The full bracket will be released along with these elim pairings 
We will release the full octos pairings (with judges) online after the doubles conclude. 

January 5th – All Rounds at the Radisson 

7:00 AM    Continental breakfast at the Radisson, 2nd Floor. 
8:00 AM    Open Octofinals start time 
10:45 AM    Octofinals Decision deadline 
11:00 AM    Postround ends 
11:30 AM    Open Quarterfinals & JV Finals start time 
2:15 PM    Decision deadline 
2:30 PM    Postround ends 
3:00 PM    Open Semifinals start time 
5:45 PM    Decision deadline 
6:00 PM    Postround ends 
6:30 PM    Finals start time 
9:00 PM    Finals decision time