The Need for Ethics and Civility in Speech and Debate Competition

Sponsors of competition – whether it be athletics, academics, fine arts or other events – all carry the responsibility of teaching students the skills of the activity, exposing them to exemplars within their disciplines, and providing them with the tools, resources and training to excel in these activities. But these sponsors and coaches also carry a responsibility that is equally, if not greater, in importance – setting and modeling ethical expectations for student participants.

Why is this an issue?
“Why do I have to teach kids to be nice – isn’t that their parents’ responsibility?” This is a common complaint, especially among high school teachers. And according to the International Center for Academic Integrity, 68 percent of college students and 98 percent of high school students admit to some form of cheating. These range from plagiarism to purchasing exams, exam questions or term papers.

One of the driving factors of rampant cheating noted by The Ad Council & Educational Testing Service Cheating Fact Sheet is the lack of serious consequences when students are caught cheating. The important thing to remember is that it really does “take a village,” to train children in the way they should go. They need to see and hear expectations consistently upheld in their community. Students will get negative messaging and temptation aplenty – from friends, from relatives, from television and movies and games. It is important that the responsible adults in their lives require moral agency of these students and show them how to develop their moral character.

Competitive activities provide opportunity and space to establish, maintain and model ethical standards. Students will win and they will lose. That is the way competition works, and we cannot protect them from failure if we expect them to grow, learn and improve. In failure, students are made aware of what they have not yet learned or mastered. Failure is the path to growing and mastering their art. Teachers and coaches have a responsibility to provide safe space for failure, to help students unlearn the stigma associated with failure, and learn that it is merely part of the process to championship.

In the same way we prepare them for failure, we must also prepare them for success. Something much less stigmatized, and often even encouraged, is the “poor winner” – the person who is praised for hard work but not held accountable for a haughty attitude, or students who forget their own moments of failure and ridicule or shame younger or less experienced participants when they are not as successful.

These students model an attitude that speech and debate programs cannot afford. These programs tend to be less supported financially in districts, and often left in the hands of a single coach – regardless of the number of students enrolled. Students in speech and debate often suffer bullying from the larger student population for anything from being “too smart” to “too different” from mainstream students. One thing these students don’t need from their own competitive community is to be told they don’t belong because they are still learning their craft. In this community, inclusion should always be a priority.

Working with students is difficult sometimes, but something that can alleviate stress is to have a plan in place for handling ethical dilemmas and violations. Following are some suggestions for establishing and maintaining ethical expectations.

1. Articulate ethical expectations from the beginning. Your team handbook should identify behavior expectations in the classroom as well as at tournaments. Make your expectations clear from the outset regarding competition rules, treatment of opponents, judges, other coaches and tournament officials, and anyone with whom they will come in contact participating on your team. Competing with someone doesn’t justify humiliating them.

2. Engage in the difficult conversations. When one of your students crosses the line, sit with them. Let them know that you care about them and their growth as a person more than you care about the number of trophies they earn. When one of your students is victimized by someone, a bully or a cheater, sit with them. Let them know that you understand the pain they are experiencing and you care about it. Even if what’s happened is difficult to talk about or makes you uncomfortable, be willing to engage in these conversations with and on behalf of your students.

3. Be an advocate for your student. If one of your students is treated unfairly by another competitor, by a judge, by a teammate, stand with the student. Teach your students to stand up for those who are treated unfairly – whether on their team or another.

4. Hold your team accountable. Have measures in place similar to what your school’s student handbook provides for infractions. Let students and parents know what the expectations are and what will happen when they are violated. Work with your administration to provide fair consequences. If you haven’t ever put a team handbook together, talk to older coaches who have, get examples, compare handbooks used by other organizations in your school or district.

5. Model success for your students. Coaches can do this by mentoring other coaches as well as by creating mentoring programs within their team. Create expectations of your varsity team members to show novices the ropes. This allows them to teach what they have learned and benefits both parties. In addition, as your students see you helping other coaches at tournaments and workshops, they understand their role as a champion includes not merely working for their own success but creating a legacy of success as they help others.

6. Model failure for your students. It’s important that we model failure by admitting when we don’t know something and creating an environment where students and coaches learn together. Modeling lifelong learning is key in any educational environment, but especially in speech and debate when coaches are responsible for helping students learn not only the events in which they compete, but the many different topic areas to which they are exposed within in a single calendar year.

What speech and debate coaches accomplish in a single year is remarkable. The amount of content knowledge delivered across a litany of events, over the course of a student’s four-year high school career by itself is astounding. Add to that the responsibility of showing students how to be good humans and it can seem overwhelming. But our failure to set these expectations for our students serves no one, not our students, not our colleagues, not our communities.

Works Cited
1. “Facts and Statistics.” ICAI, https://academicintegrity.org/resources/facts-and-statistics.
2. “Cheating Is a Personal Foul.” Cheating Fact Sheet – Research Center – Cheating Is a Personal Foul, The Ad Council & Educational Testing Service, 1999, http://www.glass-castle.com/clients/www-nocheating-org/adcouncil/research/cheatingfactsheet.html.