Lincoln-Douglas Debate
Learn Foundational Skills in Style, Content, and Strategy in Lincoln Douglas Debate
This workshop will prepare students to compete in Lincoln-Douglas debate.
Level: All Levels
The workshop is designed for students with experience in Lincoln-Douglas debate.
Summer 2025 Sessions
In-Person:
Session Two: July 13 - July 25, 2025
Tuition
In-person
Resident: $4,049
Commuter: $2,949
More Information Coming Soon!
About the Program
Philosophy
Our workshop was created to provide the best possible educational experience for all levels of students. We ask you to consider some important qualities that distinguish the Harvard Debate Council Lincoln Douglas Debate Camp from others. Our Lincoln Douglas staff this year is unlike any other in terms of experience, diversity of teaching styles, argument preferences, and other core identifiers of diversity. Members of our staff have coached championships (and/or won themselves) at all levels of forensic competition including the National Debate Tournament, the Cross Examination Debate Association, the National Speech and Debate Association Championships, the Tournament of Champions, the National Debate Coaches Association Championships, and virtually every major invitational in the United States.
The Harvard Debate Council Lincoln Douglas program seeks to balance a true understanding of complex concepts while making sure students have the practical tools needed to enjoy competitive success during the debate season. Our approach is battle-tested through many years of working with some of the most successful Lincoln Douglas debaters in the country.
We believe the best way to achieve our goal for our students is to tailor our instruction to meet the needs of our Lincoln Douglas students. We do not believe “one type of instruction fits all.” We place incredible career educators alongside the best young Lincoln Douglas debate alumni to combine the best debate trends with serious educational thought. There are many great debaters. There are far fewer great teachers of debate. We believe that students, parents, and coaches should collectively weigh all of the available information to assess which summer experience would best benefit each student, and work hard to implement this for students attending our Lincoln Douglas Debate Camp.
Learning Objectives
The Lincoln Douglas curriculum of any institute is crucial to what a student is likely to gain. In this regard, one should consider whether a debate institute offers a curriculum that addresses the diversity of conditions students are likely to confront in their debate careers. One should also consider whether the student would be taught an educationally sound set of practices or a series of tricks that happened to work at a single tournament or in front of a small number of judges.
Our senior staff members have taught at dozens of workshops around the country. The core of the staff is composed of professional educators, some with Master’s degrees in education, who are also competitive coaches in the debate game.
Our approach to Lincoln Douglas debate is pedagogically sound and time-tested in terms of competitive success. Students will have guaranteed access to all Lincoln Douglas Debate staff members. At many institutes, a student’s exposure to staff is limited to lab leaders and large group lectures. We want all students to have one-on-one attention with the instructor of their choice at some point during their stay.
The curriculum is designed to give students a common knowledge base in Lincoln Douglas debate, yet avoids hours and hours of lectures on issues that have become tangential to contemporary Lincoln Douglas debate. Each year we have modified our program at previous workshops based on feedback from coaches and students.
Components of our Lincoln Douglas Debate Camp curriculum include the following:
- Our pedagogy emphasizes small lab groups. Students will be given enrichment exercises to accelerate their growth.
- The Lincoln Douglas Debate literature base many students are using is changing. While we teach about Rawls, Nozick, Kant, and JS Mill we will also teach you about Wilderson, Hartman, Hooks, and Charles Mills.
- We focus on teaching students ethically sound best practices for Lincoln Douglas Debate in dealing with the arguments that seem to pervade many circuits.
- We offer a balance of large group lectures and electives to allow students to focus on things they wish to learn/work on.
- More actual debating (after sufficient time to prepare and modify cases) to allow students the opportunity to address weaknesses and emphasize areas of strength.
- Electives -Our workshop offers a vast array of electives beginning the first week of the workshop. At Harvard Debate Council workshops, we attempt to offer electives that cater to all skill levels. Most importantly, students have to opportunity to choose electives during each elective cycle.
The Harvard Debate Council workshops will also focus on how to research, a skill that many camps seem to have put on the back burner. Attention will also be placed on effective case writing, effective speaking techniques, strategic decisions, and general tips to help students achieve whatever goals they have set for themselves in Lincoln Douglas Debate.
Sample Schedule
The following is a sample schedule for the Lincoln-Douglas Debate Program. Schedules will vary by division and day. This schedule is provided to give you an idea of what a typical day looks like at Harvard Debate Council Summer Workshops.
8:00 am – 9:00 am – Breakfast
9:00 am-10:15 am — Electives
Flowing
Intro to the K
Politics DA I: What Is It?
Debating Someone Older [or better] than you….and winning!
Queer Theory I: Judith Butler
Baudrillard
Advanced CX
10:15am-11:30am — Lab Session
11:30 am-1:00 pm — Lunch
1:00 pm-1:45 pm — Advisory Groups
2:00 pm-3:45 pm — Lab Session
4:00 pm-5:00 pm — Electives
Topicality I: Introduction
Extensions & Weighing
Politics DA II: Midterms
Critical Pedagogy
Performance Debate In an Hour
5:00-6:30 pm — Dinner
6:30 pm-8:00 pm — Evening Activities/Office Hours
What Students and Parents Say
"My lab leaders always took the time to move at my pace and had so much patience whenever I asked them to explain things. I also appreciated my kind lab mates."
"I really appreciated that my lab leaders explained parts to the progressive style debate. I truly have a way better grasp of K, CP, DA, etc. now. My lab members were also really nice and helped me during this amazing experience."
"We did drills often -- the theory drills were helpful. Being forced to debate off of paper was good for my rebuttal skills!"
Aaron Timmons
Aaron W. Timmons is an internationally recognized educator, debate coach, and program director with over 40 years of experience building award-winning speech and debate programs. He currently serves as the Director of Debate at Greenhill School, serves as an Assistant Debate Coach at Harvard College, and is a core faculty member of the Harvard Debate Council Summer Debate Workshops.
Mr. Timmons was the USA Debate Team Co-Head Coach who captured the 2023 World Schools Debating Championship in Hanoi, Vietnam. As the longtime Director of Debate at Greenhill School in Addison, Texas, he developed one of the most successful debate programs in the country. He is one of only two coaches in the United States whose students have won National Speech & Debate Association (NSDA) National Championships in three separate debate categories, and the only coach in history to win multiple championships in two of the three categories.
His teams have earned major victories at the Tournament of Champions (TOC), winning the World Schools Division in both 2024 and 2025, as well as the Policy Debate Division once again in 2025, further cementing his program’s national dominance. In 2025, his team also took first place at the inaugural Harvard World Schools Debate Round Robin, displaying excellence on yet another elite stage.
His students have also won Individual Event titles at NSDA, the Tournament of Champions, as well as the National Individual Events Tournament of Champions.
Mr. Timmons has been honored with an induction into the NSDA Hall of Fame, the Tournament of Champions Hall of Fame, and the Texas Forensic Association Hall of Fame. He also serves on the Board of the National Association of Urban Debate Leagues (NAUDL), where he advocates for expanding debate access nationwide in underserved communities across the country.
His international work includes leading workshops, summer programs, and training sessions across the globe. He has taught in the United Arab Emirates, Slovenia, Mexico, Qatar, and other countries, and has supported student success at competitions throughout North America, Europe, and Asia, including events in Canada, Germany, Indonesia, Singapore, Vietnam, and more.
A passionate advocate for World Schools Debate in the U.S., Mr. Timmons brings a culturally aware, globally minded approach to communication education. He is especially excited to help integrate Lincoln-Douglas Debate into the Harvard Debate Council’s summer curriculum, further expanding opportunities for students to grow as thinkers, speakers, and global citizens.
Temitope Ogundare
Temitope Ogundare has competed for 8 years at both Newark Science and Rutgers-Newark across varying formats (policy, LD, NDT/CEDA policy, NFA-LD, Public Forum, and British Parliamentary). In high school, Temitope was invited to multiple Round Robins, in many late elimination rounds, and qualified to and competed at NSDA Nationals in both policy and LD. At Rutgers, Temitope championed multiple tournaments across the varying formats and worked to better the debate community such as engaging in competition with the Bard Prison Initiative. Temitope has been coaching alongside competing since 2019 and is continually inspired by debaters who care to learn and grow. She loves teaching critical and policy based strategies with her top 3 2NRS being the K, T, DA and believes that more debaters should be willing to engage both sides of the library. She loves the practice of research and is excited to have discussions on all the ins and out of debates in both contents and forms.
Elijah Smith
Eli Smith has 17 years of experience as a competitor and coach in debate. He has coached champions of the TOC and NDCA, a TOC top speaker, and multiple other top speakers and elim participants in LD debate. Eli has an extensive record of coaching First-Round teams in college policy debate and had teams place in the late elims of both CEDA and the NDT. His favorite part of debate is CX and he believes more students would benefit from focusing on mastering this speech. He believes that well-rounded students perform the best each year and is happy to work with students on almost any argument. Eli's favorite debate strategies involve the use of Kritiks, counterplans, and smart case presses.
Colton Gilbert
Colton is a Debate Coach and Teacher at Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas. He has been involved in competitive speech and debate since 2004. In. undergrad, Colton focused on Communication Studies with a minor in mathematics. In grad school, Colton received a Master’s in Communication Studies from Arkansas State University and a Master’s in Secondary Education from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. In 2013 Colton was coach of the 2013 Team IPDA collegiate national champion. Since the summer of 2014, Colton has been Arkansas’s delegate at NFHS Policy Debate Topic Selection where he served as chair of the Wording Committee in Summer of ’22; he authored the national policy debate topic for the 2020-2021 school year (Criminal Justice Reform). Colton is the recipient of the Marian G. Lacey Award which is given to the Educator of the Year for the Little Rock School District. Colton just finished his twelfth (12th) year of teaching at the high school level. In addition to his debate endeavors, Colton champions himself as an advocate for his students; he is a recent recipient of the Courageous Client Award from the Lawyers’ Committee at the Higginbotham Gala 2024 for his role in Walls et. al v Sanders challenging the anti-CRT ban in the state of Arkansas. Colton has always prided himself on being an advocate and centers his debate coaching philosophy by reminding his students that “the well from which you drink you did not dig.” Colton is an avid reader, intense video gamer, and innovative educator that seeks to challenge his students in ways he wish he had gotten in school. In his spare time, he enjoys video games on his Xbox and spending time with his beloved niece. Colton’s areas of emphasis include research tactics, race-centric arguments, kritikal debate as well as IR-based arguments.
Jonathan Alston
Jonathan Alston is a high school English teacher and a two-diamond coach for Science Park High School (Newark Science) in New Jersey. After graduating from Yale University, Jonathan coached eight NJ State Champions in Lincoln-Douglas debate, was the coach of the 2018 NDCA Dukes/Bailey winner, and has had debaters make it to late elimination rounds and top speaker positions at Stanford, Emory, Greenhill, Wake Forest, Harvard, the Tournament of Champions, and NSDA Nationals, including the second speaker in policy debate in 2015. He has also coached two members of the USA Debate team. Because of Jonathan’s commitment to leadership and service to the speech and debate communities, he was named 2014 National Debate Coach Association Educator of the Year, the 2016 Glenn Pelham Award winner, and a member of the prestigious Barkley Forum Key Society. He was inducted into the National Speech and Debate Association Hall of Fame in 2023.
Elizabeth Elliott
Elizabeth Elliott is currently studying Political Science and Anthropology at Wake Forest where she debates. Debating at Wake she has reached elimination rounds at multiple college tournaments.. In high school, she did LD at Isidore Newman School where she cleared at the TOC twice and received ten round-robin invitations. She is currently an assistant LD coach at the Greenhill school. Her interests in the debate include topicality, process counterplans, creative AFF writing, impact turns, and kritiks. She is so excited to work with students this summer!
Blake Ziegler
Blake Ziegler is the Associate Director of Debate and Speech at The Delores Taylor Arthur School for Young Men in New Orleans, LA. With over a decade of experience in Lincoln-Douglas Debate, his students regularly reach elimination rounds at local and national tournaments. He has also coached NSDA elimination round participants every year and state champions. He is well-versed in every argumentative style, but has particular interest in philosophy and critical arguments. His favorite part of debate is research and developing narrative, which he is excited to share the joys of this summer. Outside of debate, Blake works in Jewish advocacy. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame with a B.A. in political science and philosophy.
Niranjan Desphande
Niranjan is a rising sophomore at Harvard University studying Philosophy and Mathematics. He did LD for 3 years at Collegiate (NY), where he won the Newark Invitational and qualified to both the Tournament of Champions and NSDA Nationals. Now, as a member of Harvard's Policy Debate team, he has reached elimination rounds at multiple national tournaments and debated at the NDT. His favorite arguments to read are policy-style, but he also loves thinking about counterplan competition and theory debates.
Andrew Brandt
Andrew Brandt debated for four years at Isidore Newman School in LD and is a rising freshman at the University of Michigan. He received eight bids to the TOC, over ten round robin invitations, and reached late elimination rounds at tournaments such as Apple Valley, Cal Berkeley, and the NYC Invitational. In more traditional forms of debate, he was top ten and second speaker at NSDA Nationals in LD his junior year. His debate interests include any variety of kritik, topicality, and creative affirmative innovation. Andrew is extremely excited to work with students this summer!
Christopher Randall
Christopher Randall is a former collegiate debater for Rutgers University and a past panelist for the prestigious Copeland Award, which recognizes teams demonstrating season-long excellence in competitive debate. He has served the National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) as a tournament administrator at the National Tournament in the Lincoln-Douglas division, and has contributed as an assistant coach to several nationally recognized debate programs, including Newark Science and Greenhill School. With extensive experience working at various summer debate workshops, Mr. Randall brings a wealth of knowledge and enthusiasm to his teaching. He is thrilled to be joining the Harvard Debate Council’s Summer Workshops, where he looks forward to helping students grow as thinkers, speakers, and competitors.
Ashley Lourenco
Ashley is a a Questbridge rising freshman at Amherst College. She debated in Policy and LD for 6 years at Newark Science. In her career, she was in elimination rounds of national tournaments, received multiple round robin invites, and championed tournaments. In her senior year she qualified to the TOC in LD and received 2 bids in Policy. She was the NJ state champion in Policy debate for the last 3 years of her high school career and a 2x NSDA qualifier. She has the most background in structural and identity kritiks, but is also excited to talk about foundational policy skills. As a Harvard alumna, she’s happy to return as an instructor!
DiMarvin Puerto
DiMarvin is a Graduate Assistant Coach at Wake Forest University. As an educator, I enjoy deliberate conversations and critical thinking that propel students to become adaptive in their argumentation and effective in their speaking. He is a Chicago Debates alumnus who has had a successful career. During his career at Wake Forest University, he became a CEDA Champion, two-time CEDA finalist, and an NDT Quarterfinalist within three years of competition. Recently, he has been featured as the 2025 Chicago Debates Cydney Edward’s Alumni of the Year award and the 2025 CEDA Critic of the Year of the Southeast Central Region. He specializes in black critical literature surrounding antiblackness, performance debate, black feminist materialism, and practical pessimism.