KU dean to help set guidelines for state and local political debates

LAWRENCE -- A dean at the University of Kansas will apply her research on presidential debates to help improve political debates on the state and local levels.

Diana Carlin, dean of the Graduate School and International Studies and professor of communication studies at KU, recently was appointed a member of the Board of Advisors of the Debate Advisory Standards Project.

The project -- funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and chaired by Peter L. Francia at the University of Maryland and Roland A. Faucheux, editor-in-chief of Campaigns & Elections magazine -- is designed to develop guidelines that sponsoring organizations and the news media can use when putting on debates for state and local candidates.

"I've been interested in local debates before, but this is the first time someone has actually done a serious study of them," she said.

For the past three presidential elections, Carlin has headed Debate Watch, a national program sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates. Debate Watch conducted a number of discussion groups across the nation immediately following presidential debates and developed a kit that makes it easy for communities to hold their own organized discussions.

As someone who has collected and analyzed thousands of responses from viewers, Carlin has a good sense of what voters do and don't want in their political debates. Mostly, she said, that means making sure the moderator's questions stay focused on the issues.

She also sees some format changes that could make state and local debates more accessible.

"A lot of these debates are never televised or are televised Saturday evening or often at 10:30 on Sunday night -- which aren't the best times to reach people," she said. "As far as Kansas is concerned, I would like to see us have at least one prime-time debate on local television that is at least an hour long with questions framed by citizens."

Other format changes Carlin said she would like to see in state and local debates include ensuring that one candidate doesn't answer first on every question and making sure that plenty of time is allotted for follow-up questions and rebuttals.

Carlin said she hopes to work with sponsoring organizations for the upcoming state and local debates in Kansas this year, making the state a case study for future political debates across the nation.

Even though the aim is to improve state and local debates, Carlin said she expects the project to help improve the presidential debates, as well.

"It's nice this project is being done in an off presidential election year because it will give us a chance to do some experimenting and enhance the presidential debates, too," she said.