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DEBATE FORMAT
1. All rounds will be Cross-EX with an 8-3-5 format and 8 minutes prep.
2. National debate topic for high schools will be used.
3. A champ team is any team in which either debater debated prior to the 2004
fall semester. (Gates has a question about this, but will find out and let you
know)
4. Any team arriving more than 10 minutes late for a round shall forfeit that round.
5. There will be at least three preliminary rounds of debate.
2009 - 2010 Debate Topic/Resolution
Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially increase social services
for persons living in poverty in the United States.
Unfortunately, more than four decades after Michael Harrington identified those living in poverty as "The
Other America," poverty is still an endemic problem in the United States. In 2005, close to 13 percent of the total U.S. population
- about 37 million people - were counted as living below the poverty line, a number that essentially remained unchanged from
2004. Of these, 12.3 million were children. Poverty is associated with many harmful outcomes, including poor health, crime,
educational difficulties and other social problems. Poverty continues to plague our society despite over four decades of national
effort and trillions of dollars in federal spending to combat it. In a nation as wealthy as the United States, such a high
level of poverty is certainly appropriate for the examination and reflection provided by a variety of debates on the topic.
Affirmatives advocating this topic will be able to define a wide range of social services designed to both ameliorate the
harms of poverty and to reduce the number of people living in poverty. These services would include expanding child care,
health care, Food Stamps, housing assistance, mental health care, educational assistance, early Head Start and job training,
among others. Negatives would be able to debate against the harms of poverty, the ability of various plans to solve the problems
identified and many disadvantages, including spending, politics, federalism and net widening. They would be able to counterplan
many of the affirmative plans with the state counterplan. The negative would also have several critical options, including
objectivism, statism, dependency, and even critiquing the use of the term poverty.
Author: Chuck Ballingall, California
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