With Tanesha Walker, Rashid Campbell (above) advanced to the final round at Nationals.

In April, four students and their coaches traveled to New York City to compete against the top teams from 24 urban debate leagues representing cities across the country in the annual Urban Debate National Championship.  The team from Oakland, made up of EXCEL’s Tanesha Walker and Skyline’s Rashid Campbell, reached the tournament’s final round to be crowned runners-up of the national championship bracket for the nation’s youngest urban debate leagues.  Along the way, they dispatched successful teams from Atlanta, Dallas, and Memphis, ultimately meeting the eventual national champions from Denver in the tournament’s final round.

Rashid, who has earned a full-ride scholarship to debate at Oklahoma University next year, had already earned a 14th-place speaker’s gavel trophy for his unique oratory skills which were on display through the six 84-minute debates held over the first two days of the tournament.  Rashid remarked to his coach and BAUDL staff on his way home from the tournament that the weekend had been the “greatest experience of my life!”  EXCEL coach Sebastian Castrechini further adds his perspective on the tournament experience:

Rashid quickly built up a reputation as the one who raps during his speeches, and Tanesha and Rashid were able to build his raps into an argument about how important it is to include the voices of common people — the people for whom this year’s topic is trying to solve — into policy discourses.  I think that is a great example of what [Skyline Coach Chris Scheer] talked about in terms of our kids finding a place where they can fit in the world of academics.  Another incredibly valuable piece of the experience was getting to interact with other debaters and coaches from around the country.  Tanesha found another person who will be going to UCLA, and they both connected with Ed Lee to figure out a way to start a policy debate team there.  They built friendships (as well as rivalries) with the other debaters and even exchanged contact information with some of their judges who offered to talk through ideas for arguments with them.  I think being tapped into that network of people is going to be invaluable to them finding future opportunities.  Even aside from their success, I was thrilled that the two of them got to be a part of this, which they both did so much to earn.