GROVE CITY, Pa. – The Grove City College’s nationally ranked Speech and Debate Team won its seventh tournament of the 2008-09 year at Bowling Green State University’s “Get-A-Clue Mystery Tournament” Feb. 28.

Grove City won out over teams from Malone University, Hillsdale College and Purdue University. Now in its third year of Parliamentary debate competition, the team is ranked seventh out of more than 200 schools nationally.

The College “closed out” the Feb. 28 tournament, having two teams reach the final round. When this happens, Dr. Steven Jones, adviser and associate professor of sociology, does not let the teams debate, in order to foster team unity. The teams that closed out were junior Luke Juday of Chesapeake, Va., with sophomore Dayne Batten of Cary, N.C., and sophomores Harrison Ealey of Brecksville, Ohio with Alex Pepper of Centreville, Va. Additionally, sophomore Evan Denlinger of Narvon, Pa., and junior Abigail Keifman of Saxton, Pa., competed in the quarterfinals and won speaker awards, which honor individual debaters. Keifman won the first place speaker award.
 
 “I expected us to have a pretty good year,” Jones said. “I thought we would be in the quarterfinals and semifinals in virtually every tournament. I didn’t expect us to be in finals every tournament. And I certainly didn’t expect us to do this well as a squad.”

He attributes the squad’s success to its extensive background knowledge on a variety of subjects, as well as the team’s strategy to argue based on facts, not assertions.

“We try to simply win on content,” Jones said. “We just know what we’re talking about better than the other teams. Grove City students have a pretty broad knowledge of the world, and particularly of civics and philosophy and economic philosophy.”

“Although it’s all one association, there are regional differences and variations,” Jones said. “We’re going to the West Coast and the judging pool will be largely West Coast judges. It will all depend on how well we adapt to that.”

Jones said that the judges will have seen many of the West Coast teams before. “We’ll be new,” he said. “That can be good or bad.”

The squad will compete at the 12th annual National Christian College Forensics Invitational from March 13-15 at Biola University in La Mirada, Calif. Jones said that the competition will be steep.

Jones is clear on his hopes for the team. “My goal every year is to finish in the top 25 nationally ranked programs,” he said. “[There are] 250 teams that rank nationally, and I always want to be in the top 25.”

Dr. Jason Edwards, associate professor of education, also advises the team with Jones.