I am forwarding Sarah's original email to ceda-l and asking for input from folks on both lists.
The leadership of CEDA and the NDT are working together to provide a coordinated response to the Miami administration. I applaud the efforts of individuals to reach out to administrators and positively convey the importance of debate. We also need folks who are familiar with the university and department to help tailor our response. If you are in such a position or know of someone who is, please have them contact me. I would also reinforce Justin Green's prescient call from earlier this semester. In this economic climate, even programs with strong institutional support for the activity will experience very difficult decisions. If you see that your university is considering a substantial reduction in support, please reach out to the organizations and local community as soon as possible. No one has a magic solution here, but we need to do our best to explain the values of keeping the activity central to university life, even if budgets decline. I know we will be having a larger conversation on this subject this spring, but in the interim please take the time to support this program. Thanks Gordon Gordon Stables, Ph.D. Director of Debate & Forensics Annenberg School for Communication University of Southern California Office: 213 740 2759 Fax: 213 740 3913 www.usctrojandebate.com ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Sarah Spring <[email protected]> Date: Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 10:34 AM Subject: [eDebate] Miami Debate Team Eliminated To: [email protected] I have received some bad news today, Miami University (Ohio) has made the initial steps in cutting all funding for their policy debate program. This holds a lot of personal significance for me, but I think it is a very bad omen in general for the debate community. While the situation there has been deteriorating for a bit, I think the financial situation everywhere has the possibility of making debate budgets more vulnerable. It is in the best interest of all of our jobs and teams and families and the community that we proactively work to fend off this danger. I don't know if the Miami program can be saved, but I would like it to at least go down fighting. In this vein, I'm getting together a number of alumni to write in support of the program and its value to Miami. While these people have personal experience with the team itself, I think some outside letters to the administration could be helpful. A few quick facts, Miami is a long time participant in the NDT, attending 19 times from 1976 to 2009. Miami is the only squad other than Westpoint to host the NDT twice. The debate team is one of the oldest student organizations and was founded around 1909. The team is currently funded through the department of communication which has also eliminated its graduate program meaning no graduate assistants which have been a major part of the coaching at Miami. The department and the school, I assume, has decided to eliminate all debate coaching positions and the team's budget for the foreseeable future. The problem is, once these things are gone, they are very difficult to restart. If you could help me by writing a letter of support for the program to any or all of the following persons, expressing the value of debate and the value of the program, I would appreciate it. Thanks, Sarah Spring David Hodge President Office of the President, Roudebush Hall, 213A Oxford, OH 45056 1 513 529 2346 [email protected] Jeffrey Herbst Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs 209 Roudebush Hall Oxford, Ohio 45056 513-529-6721 [email protected] Karen Schilling Dean, College of Arts and Science 143 Upham Hall Oxford, OH 45056 (513) 529-1234 [email protected] Barbara Jones, Vice President of the Division of Student Affairs 111 Warfield Hall Oxford, OH 45056 513 529 4631 [email protected] Gary Shulman Chair, Department of Communication 162C Bachelor Hall Oxford, OH 45056 513-529-7472 [email protected] Todd Holm, Director of Forensics 156 Bachelor Hall 513-529-2278 [email protected] _______________________________________________ eDebate mailing list [email protected] http://www.ndtceda.com/mailman/listinfo/edebate _______________________________________________ CEDA-L mailing list [email protected] http://www.ndtceda.com/mailman/listinfo/ceda-l
