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Whitman National Debate Institute

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

STAFF

We have an experienced, diverse, and excellent staff to make your experience at the WNDI a great one.

Below is our expected staff for the 2012 WNDI.

We will add staff as necessary to ensure that you are placed in small labs—4 to 8 people—where you work one-on-one with our staff.

Click to go to the staff you want to view:

Head Staff 1

Policy. 3

Lincoln Douglas. 6

Public Forum.. 10

Life Duties. 12

 

 

 

 

Head Staff

Jim Hanson directs one of the nation’s most successful programs, home to a five year record as the nation’s top policy and parli combined squad, and director of teams in elims at all four 2009 & 2010 debate national championship tournaments and the 2012 runner-ups at the NPDA and CEDA National Championships. He edits the West Coast handbooks, is a highly respected Professor of Rhetoric, author of Argumentation in Context, a nationally acclaimed college argument textbook, and he makes the camp run smoothly. (Director)

hansonjb@whitman.edu

 

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Will Gent is the Head Camp Assistant Director. With three years of experience making the WNDI run smoothly, he is a current debater at the University of Puget Sound. He has been in elimination rounds at the WNPT, Washburn, William Jewell, UNLV, and CEDA Nationals tournaments. Will sets up lab assignment, file distribution, tournament tabulation, and many other administrative functions so you have a great experience at the camp.

 

Olivia Kipper is a Camp Assistant. This year, she competed at both national championship parliamentary debate tournaments and advanced to elimination rounds at the Great Salt Lake and NW Warm-up Bellevue tournaments. As a frosh, she won the University of Puget Sound and Whitman Classic tournaments in JV and advanced to doubles at Pacific Lutheran University. She is a Classics major and loves terrible TV shows. Her favorite arguments are plan inclusive counterplans and weighing impact calculus. She’s ready to help Jim and the campers have a great camp experience.

 

 

 

Additionally, Carly Johnson, Nick Griffin, and others serve as camp assistants who help setup the camp.

 

 

 

Policy

Mitch Dunn placed first at the Idaho State tournament (winning 12 of 12 ballots), UPS tournament, and semis at the Northwest Rockies Tournament as a frosh. He was in octas at the Frosh-Sophomore National Championship and is currently ranked 9th in the nation. He is also a 2 time NFL qualifier, State Champion, and semi-finalist at the Whitman high school tournament and 2nd speaker. A Politics major, he likes realism, China weapons arguments, counterplans to capture affirmative advantages and disadvantages.

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Lindsay Vanluvanee, has helped coach at Pocatello High School for three years, and her debaters have cleared at several TOC qualifying tournaments. She won top speaker at UNLV, placed second in the breakout final at the WNPT, and advanced to elims at Gonzaga. Academically, she presented the best center section at a journalism conference at the University of Utah. Her favorite debate arguments are critical and feminism-based arguments.

 

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Paul Montreiul was a first round to the NDT as a sophomore. He was in finals at USC and semis at Harvard. He was in octas at CEDA Nationals and was in elimination rounds at the NDT. He competed in Idaho for four years in high school and he is currently pursuing an education degree at the University of Nevada Las Vegas as a graduate student. He enjoys topicality arguments, Agamben and Neitzche.

 

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Tony Johnson has been involved in debate for 9 years. Currently the debate coach at San Diego State University, Tony is a 3 time NDT Qualifier, advanced to the Elims at the NDT, octos at CEDA Nationals, elims at Texas, Georgia State, Kentucky, Cal Fullerton, Gonzaga, and the Val Browning Round Robin. He coached Ashland High to the TOC for two years. His high school teams have been in elims at New Trier, Emory, Greenhill, Glenbrooks, Berkeley, Alta, Stanford, and Gonzaga.

He won the 2007 University of Wyoming essay contest for a paper on American detention camps and is a double major in Political Science & Communication. He really enjoys good topicality debates and topic specific criticisms.

 

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Jimi Durkee was the 3A Washington State Champion at Mount Vernon HS.  He was in the Quarters of CEDA Nationals and cleared at the NDT. He says he likes long walks on the beach and the Politics disadvantage.  Each year that he has coached college debate, his squad received a first round bid to the NDT. Jimi currently coaches at the University of Georgia after coaching 2 NDT qualifying teams at Whitman College.

 

Alex Zendeh, in high school, won the semis-bid Lakeland and finals-bid Bronx Science tournaments and attended the Tournament of Champions. In college, Alex won the Idaho State Tournament, was in elimination rounds at the Georgia State, Northwestern, Wake Forest, Kentucky, and USC tournaments, qualified for the National Debate Tournament twice, and was 5th in the nation at the CEDA national tournament. Due to his excellence in both academics and debate, Alex was awarded the National Debate Scholars Magna Cum Laude award. He enjoys reading about and beating the K, arguing in T debates, and running tricky CPs.

Adam McKibben is a senior at Whitman this fall. In high school, Adam was a two time qualifier for State as well as runner up qualifier for NFL nationals. In college, Adam finished first at the James M. Rupp Debates, and 2nd at the USC and Washburn tournaments. Further, in the 2011 season, Adam advanced to elims at 7 tournaments including the NPDA and NPTE national championships where he finished 27th in the nation. Adam is double majoring in history and art-history and strongly prefers straight up counterplan/disad debates.

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Zach Tschida is the debate coach at the University of Puget Sound, where he recently finished a double major in Political Theory and Economics.  Zach was a successful debater for four years at UPS.  Zach finished in Tenth place at the NPTE his senior year.  He also competed for three years of high school debate, winning the Washington State 4A championship in 2007. Zach is a shameless fan of Giorgio Agamben’s philosophical writing on sovereignty.  He is similarly shameless in his bias for critique-based arguments and theory debates. 

Ben Menzies is a sophomore at Whitman. In high school, he was in elims of Berkeley, Golden Desert, Long Beach, and Arizona State, and won the Harker tournament two consecutive years. In college, he was in semifinals of the WNPT, quarterfinals of Frosh/Sophomore Nationals, and triples of CEDA nationals, and he was the 2nd speaker at the WNPT. He has debated and enjoys many genres of arguments, including critical and policy arguments, but prefers advantage counterplans, criticisms which do not feature the name "Foucault" anywhere, and hegemony debates.

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Nick Griffin currently serves as the Policy-Parliamentary debate coach at Whitman College. In high school, he had a winning record at every tournament his junior and senior year. He graduated in the top 10% of his class while competing for four years at Gig Harbor high school. Currently debating for Whitman College, he won the WNPT, was in elims at UNLV, 5-3 at Northwestern, and has been in elims at CEDA Nationals two out of two times. He is studying environmental politics and international relations and enjoys counterplans, Malthus, and hegemony arguments.

griffinj@whitman.edu

 

 

 

 

Lincoln Douglas

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Katie Bergus is an NPDA-style parliamentary and CEDA-style policy debater from the University of Oregon. In high school, Katie did three years of Lincoln-Douglas debate for Gig Harbor High School in Washington state. She qualified to NFL nationals all three years that she debated. As a senior, she won state and was the top speaker at the tournament. In college, Katie placed 14th at NPTE her frosh year and 21st her sophomore year. Katie loves science and her favorite things to ramble about include GMOs, warming, and disease. She is an AP Scholar with Distinction and a National Merit Scholar. She likes traditional arguments that are nuanced. She loves good impact analysis and weighing. She is also a pretty big fan of Habermas.

 

 

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Nigel Leslie-Ramoz has a zany sense of humor and was an incredibly successful Whitman debater advancing to late elimination rounds at UPS, Utah, Pacific, Lewis and Clark, Whitman, WWU, PLU, NPDA Championship, Long Beach, and Texas Tech. He placed second at the NPTE National Championship. Currently, the coach of Whitman College’s parliamentary team, he has a real knack for persuasive and very energetic bursts of oratory. He enjoys theory and topicality arguments. He will make you a great LD debater.

 

 

 

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Carly Johnson is an engaging and helpful lab leader. She finished third in state in LD, second in her district in LD, and competed in out rounds at many local tournaments. In college, she won the University of Puget Sound and Whitman Classic tournaments and was in doubles at Pacific Lutheran University. She maintained over a 3.8 GPA for five consecutive semesters, was involved in national honors society, received a departmental award for Chinese and literature, and graduated with a 3.9 GPA. Her favorite arguments involve theory and providing a weighing calculus.

 

Drake Skaggs competed in Public Forum debate in Alaska for 4 years, training several partners and winning many speaker awards, including 7th at State. In college, he is a highly competitive parliamentary debater, finishing 17th at the NPDA National Championship and is currently ranked 9th in the nation in NPTE rankings. He consistently competed in late out rounds throughout last year, including closing out one half of the McMillan Swing with another Whitman team and winning the UPS national circuit tournament. He loves arguments with strong warrants and likes it when debaters try new things, as long as they justify doing so.

Paige Joki is a hard working student and debater. In high school, she graduated with high honors having a GPA over 4.0.  While in high school, Paige broke in most, won several, and received speaker awards in almost all state, regional, and national tournaments. Her senior year, she was a semi-finalist and the top LD speaker at the Whitman Classic.  Paige was debate captain at her high school for 3 years.  She also received the senior honors award for forensics.  During her summers at the WNDI, Paige received speaker awards and won the LD tournament at each camp she attended. 

Currently a sophomore at Whitman, Paige advanced at every tournament in either speech or parli debate she has attended.  She and her partner qualified for nationals, placing 27th at the NPTE.  They also advanced at the NPDA. Paige is majoring in gender studies with a double minor in politics and rhetoric and media studies.  She plans to go on to law school.  Her favorite arguments are critical arguments.  In high school, she ran a few critical affirmatives and a performance affirmative, as well as more progressive cases. She also enjoys more traditional arguments but most of her experience is in more progressive LD.

 

 

 

Public Forum

Drake Skaggs competed in Public Forum debate in Alaska for 4 years, training several partners and winning many speaker awards, including 7th at State. In college, he is a highly competitive parliamentary debater, finishing 17th at the NPDA National Championship and currently ranked 9th in the nation in NPTE rankings. He consistently competed in late out rounds throughout last year, including closing out one half of the McMillan Swing with another Whitman team. He loves arguments with strong warrants and likes it when debaters try new arguments, as long as they justify doing so.

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Nick Griffin broke at every tournament his junior year, had a winning record at every tournament his junior and senior year. He graduated in the top 10% of his class while competing for four years at Gig Harbor high school. Currently a debate coach for Whitman College, he placed 9th in the nation at the NPTE National Championship. He just finished his politics major and will be coaching at Whitman this coming year. He enjoys rhetoric and public argument.

griffinj@whitman.edu

 

 

 

Adam McKibben is a senior at Whitman this fall. In high school, Adam was a two time qualifier for State as well as runner up qualifier for NFL nationals. In college, Adam finished first at the James M. Rupp Debates, and 2nd at the USC tournament. Further, in the 2011 season, Adam advanced to elims at 7 tournaments including the NPDA and NPTE national championships where he finished 27th in the nation. Adam is double majoring in history and art-history and prefers arguments comparing policies.

 

 

 

Life Duties

Olivia Molden is the Resident Life Director for the WNDI debate camp. She graduated from Whitman College in 2011 and majored in Environmental Sociology. For the past year she has worked at Walla Walla High School in the AVID program, helping high school students get in to, and stay in, college as first generation students. During her time at Whitman, Olivia worked as a Resident Assistant for two years at the Fine Arts House and the MECCA. Olivia participated in debate, competing in Whitman Intramural Debate and the Whitman Withycombe Classic tournament, where she won the novice division.

Olivia is the Assistant Life Director. This year, she competed at both national championship parliamentary debate tournaments and advanced to elimination rounds at the Great Salt Lake and NW Warm-up Bellevue tournaments. As a frosh, she won the University of Puget Sound and Whitman Classic tournaments in JV and advanced to doubles at Pacific Lutheran University. She is a Classics major and loves terrible TV shows. Her favorite arguments are plan inclusive counterplans and weighing impact calculus. She takes over for Olivia Molden on Saturday evenings and Sunday mornings. She also works throughout the camp to help Olivia Molden help you. She’ll help you with any problems during the day when she is on duty.

Ben Menzies is a sophomore at Whitman. In high school, he was in elims of Berkeley, Golden Desert, Long Beach, and Arizona State, and won the Harker tournament two consecutive years. In college, he was in semifinals of the WNPT, quarterfinals of Frosh/Sophomore Nationals, and triples of CEDA nationals, and he was the 2nd speaker at the WNPT. He is ready to help in setting up picnics on weekends.

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Will Gent is the Head Camp Assistant Director. Will assures that student issues get resolved quickly. A debater from the University of Puget Sound, he has been in elimination rounds at the WNPT, UNLV, William Jewell, Washburn, and CEDA Nationals. Will helps assign labs and handles file distribution, and tournament tabulation. Will is there to help and does a great job.

 

 

 

 

Expected Additional Camp Helpers

Carly Johnson, Internet Helper

Tia Butler

Shanglun Wang

Jean Tobin

Bob Withycombe

 

 

 

 

 

 

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