Any college especially love debate kids?
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Anonymous
| I know debate is super common. But do any colleges especially value this? Not top nationally - I know those kids wrote their ticket - but top 25. |
Anonymous
| Wake Forest - start prepping early. They offer full scholarships for debate. |
Anonymous
| I've seen Harvard accept top debaters. But I'm not sure to what extent they were the top nationally vs. being in the top 25 nationally. |
Anonymous
| One of my young coworkers had a debate scholarship to GMU. |
Anonymous
I dont think it's a full scholarship anymore. 16k a year https://financialaid.wfu.edu/types-of-aid/scholarships/#presidential-scholarship |
Anonymous
Harvard takes top debaters but think it's top. like top 5 |
Anonymous
| Wake, Northwestern |
Anonymous
They don't have a hard and fast rule about this. If someone is good at debate--they may be strong in other application areas. Colleges love people who excel in general. A top 25 national debate kid should be attractive overall, assuming they have other strengths. |
Anonymous
well, sure. but that's like saying a very good fencer might also be good at other things. of course! but that's not getting you into harvard. |
Anonymous
| Northwestern & Dartmouth, but you need to be a prominent debater on a national scale. |
Anonymous
| It's been a long time, but in my day, Dartmouth and Northwestern were the best overall schools with strong policy debate programs and coaches who had some influence with admissions. If your kid is really involved in debate, they meet the coaches at summer camps or on the national circuit and take it from there. |
Anonymous
|
I think there are big differences between schools recruiting for their policy debate teams (e.g., Emory, Wake Forest) as though they were recruiting athletes and other schools. If you're looking at the former, then obviously specifically how good you are at policy debate is the #1 key thing as long as you meet other academic metrics; if you're looking at the latter, than 3rd vs 8th nationally in debating is less important than the overall picture, because both would count as a top tier EC.
I would note that the top student run parli debate teams over the last 25 years are probably Yale, Princeton, Harvard, UChicago and GW, though with enormous variation year-to-year, so those are all likely schools taking spikey debate kids. |
Anonymous
Anyone can sign up for the debate team after being admitted to Harvard. I'm not sure their debate coach can influence admissions, though. Harvard's success in debate is likely more a result of selection bias than institutional support. |
Anonymous
| Michigan likes debate. Top 25 nationally would be very appealing imo |
Anonymous
USC has historically recruited for debate and has a good coach and NDT qualifiers if you're looking to the West Coast. |