Our Curriculum | Libertas Debate

CURRICULUM

Personalized Instruction At Its Best

Lab groups are students’ home base at camp. Students are placed in labs according to their skill-level. Each lab has 12 students paired with and meets daily.

Lab time focuses on lectures, drills, and research. In lab, students will be introduced to advanced new strategies and positions and practice those skills immediately in exercises guided by the instructors. Students will also spend lab time strengthening their case-writing and preparation skills by crafting new arguments they can deploy in their practice debates and during the regular debate season.

Begin Debate With a Head Start

We provide students with a starter packet containing several pre-written cases on the selected camp topic. This allows students to begin their practice debates at the start of camp, allowing our students to have more practice debates than any other camp. The packet also helps students get the most from their practice debates, as it ensures debates will center around thoroughly prepared and high-quality arguments.

Along with the starter packet, students spend part of lab working on a research project to produce cases of their own that they can deploy in their practice debates and even the competitive season.

Practice, Practice, Practice

By the end of camp, our students will have debated in over a dozen practice rounds, each followed by detailed comments from an instructor. Practice debates give students a chance to try out arguments they lack experience with, outside the high-stakes environment of a debate tournament. After every round, students redo speeches from the debate to ensure that feedback is implemented immediately.

Learn From Experts

Elective lectures students the opportunity to learn from our instructors in their area of debate expertise. Students can select a lecture to attend from a variety of options each day, supplementing the concepts they have learned in lab. Lectures typically focus on one popular argument or strategy – past titles include “Hegemony and Militarism,” “Advanced Kant,” “Debating Meta-Theory,” and “Afro-Pessimism.”

Daily Schedule

Each day, students will attend lectures and lab, work with mentors, and have practice debates from 9 AM to 8 PM, with breaks for lunch and dinner.

An example of a typical weekday at camp might look like this:

8 AM – 9 AM: Breakfast (Residents only)

9 AM – 10:30 AM: Elective lecture

10:30 AM – 12 PM: Lab time

12 PM – 1 PM: Lunch

1 PM – 4 PM: Practice debates

4 PM – 5 PM: Lab time

5 PM – 6 PM: Dinner

6 PM – 8 PM: Lab/Mentor time

On Saturdays, academic activities begin late and end early, with a fun activity scheduled for the evening. Sunday is our Fun Day and includes no academic activities.