KU News Release

KU, Texas Southern teams to debate ‘The Impact of Race in Education’ on Oct. 10

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LAWRENCE — “The Impact of Race in Education” will be examined by two of the nation’s most respected collegiate debate squads: the University of Kansas and Texas Southern University from Houston.

The two teams have agreed to a noncompetitive public debate at 3:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 10, in the Commons at Spooner Hall. The debate is part of KU’s Hall Center for the Humanities’ Difficult Dialogues: Race, Education and American Politics series, co-sponsored by the Commons.

The goal of the debate is an exchange of ideas, not a victory. Debate coaches Scott Harris at KU and Thomas Freeman at Texas Southern liken the event to a presidential debate in which a moderator poses questions.

Both coaches have outstanding records of winning teams and programs.

Under Harris’ leadership, KU finished the 2007-08 season as the No. 1 team in the country in the National Debate Tournament varsity rankings. KU has won the national championship four times. KU’s debate program dates to 1890, and Harris is beginning his 18th year as the team’s coach. In 2006 and 2007, National Debate Tournament officials named Harris the Debate Coach of the Year.

Texas Southern is a historically black university. Freeman is the distinguished professor of forensics at Texas Southern, where he has coached for 59 years. His teams have earned the International Forensics Championship titles in 2002 in Rome, in 1994 in Munich and 1992 in London. The Texas Southern T.F. Freeman Center for Forensic Excellence was named to honor Freeman’s career and service.

More recently, Freeman was recognized for his role as an adviser to Denzel Washington for the 2007 film “The Great Debaters.” The movie is based on the 1935 tournament in which Wiley College, a historically black college in Marshall, Texas, defeated the national champion, the University of Southern California. In the film, the debate is between Harvard University and Wiley College.

Freeman’s former students include the late Congresswoman Barbara Jordan and former Texas Southern Provost James Race. While Freeman taught at Morehouse College in Atlanta in 1947, Martin Luther King Jr. was among his students.

Both Texas Southern and KU compete in Cross Examination Debate Association tournaments but have not debated directly in recent memory. Collegiate debate programs vary in styles and may include policy, parliamentary and Lincoln-Douglas, or values, debates. KU participates in policy debates, including the National Debate Tournament. Texas Southern participates in parliamentary and other debates styles and competes in the International Forensics Association and other tournaments.

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