LD and PF Club Team registration for the 2022-2023 debate season is now open!
Our online summer camp features expert instruction in Lincoln-Douglas (LD) and Public-Forum (PF) debate. We are the only camp in the United States that offers 1-on-1 tutoring as a core component of camp! Learn from former debate champions at a customized pace based on your schedule and skill.
PF: June 19 - July 1, 2022
LD: June 5 - June 26, 2022
Upcoming Camps
Dates coming soon!
Lincoln-Douglas
Dates coming soon!
Public Forum
Register before February 28th and receive $200 off!
"The summer before my senior year, I decided to skip a formal 2 or 3-week debate camp and instead attend DebateDrills' Online Debate Camp. This was one of the best debate decisions I made, and I’d highly recommend you consider doing something similar if you are serious about debate."
Parker Whitfill
2017 National Champion (TOC) + 3rd Speaker
"The DebateDrills Online Debate Camp fueled countless hours of relentless drilling and facilitated a slow, focused mastery of debate that I have not found at any other program."
Max Perin
Top 10 Ranked Debater, 2021-2022 Season
"The DebateDrills Online Camp offered a variety of valuable resources that really helped me progress with areas of debate I was inexperienced in. The individual, focused training helped me target my weaknesses in debate and rapidly improve through practice."
Ali Ansari
3rd Place, 2021 Harvard-Westlake Invitational
“You won't be spending countless hours preparing for a hypothetical topic or weakly covering different areas of debate. Instead, you'll be working with some of the best debate minds in the nation and discussing high-level debates with a depth that other camps and programs don't go into.”
Advay Chandra
3rd Place, 2020 Cypress Bay Varsity Invitational
“What's different about DebateDrills' Online Debate Camp compared to other camps I've gone to, and what I liked the most, was that everything was very individualized, from my learning material to the pacing. At other camps, even if I grasped a topic, if one of my peers did not, we would have to spend more time covering it. However, with DebateDrills' Online Camp, time was allocated to everything I struggled with.”
Rosalyn Li
Roeper School Class of 2022
“The biggest positive of DebateDrills' Online Camp was the 1-1 tutoring experience because while other camps usually just move along at a set pace and try to cover a lot of concepts for everyone, the tutoring really helped me hone in on specific skills and helped me improve them significantly at my own pace.”
Pranav Kaginele
3rd Place, 2021 Barklay Forum Invitational
“The DebateDrills Online Camp's unique combination of tutoring plans tailored to my individual needs as well as various practice drills such as the Rebuttal Redo Packets provided for a far more educational experience in comparison to other camps that I've attended in the past.”
Arnav Garg
Top 10 Debater, 2021-2022 Debate Season
“The DebateDrills Online Debate Camp allowed me to work at my own pace and really work on things as much as I needed to without having to do busy work or useless drills that I was forced into at other camps.”
Tanay Bawa
Lovejoy High School Class of 2022
“Having camp online was an amazing journey, I still experienced the rigor of an in-person camp with much more flexible scheduling around other summer activities.”
Teja Buddhavarapu
5th Place, 2020 Columbia Varsity Invitational
"Compared to other camps, the DebateDrills Online Camp does an excellent job at fine-tuning their content depending on the individual needs of students. I was able to choose hours that worked well for me, and everyone was extremely accommodating."
Sameer Nayyar
3rd Place, 2020 Apple Valley Varsity Invitational
All group camp activities occur on weekday evenings and weekends- please see schedule below for 2022 timings (all times in PST). Tutoring is scheduled at each family's convenience. Are you interested in working with us this Summer but these timings don't fit your schedule? Please get in touch and we can discuss accommodations.
The DebateDrills Online Speech and Debate Summer Camp is an individualized learning opportunity for students interested in Public Forum (PF) and Lincoln-Douglas (LD) debate. Designed for middle school and high school students ranging from novices to advanced debaters, campers explore new topics and dive deep into areas they have previously struggled with. We are the only summer debate camp in the United States that requires each student to complete 1-on-1 tutoring as a core curricular component.
"Compared to other camps, the DebateDrills Online Summer Camp did an excellent job at fine-tuning their content depending on my individual needs. I was able to choose hours that worked well for me, extensively tutor 1-on-1 with experts, work on other non-debate activities, and everyone was extremely accommodating."
- Sameer Nayyar | Loyola High School '21
3rd Place, 2020 Varsity Division, Apple Valley Invitational
2021 TOC Qualifier
A past alumni of the program, Parker Whitfill, subsequently went on to win the Tournament of Champions, widely considered the most difficult and prestigious tournament in the United States. He summed up the program as follows:
“The main difference between DebateDrills’ Online Debate Camp and other residential debate camps is the focus on skill improvement. DebateDrills’ Online Camp was 75% skill focused while other residential camps I had attended were closer to 25%. Large residential debate camps simply don’t have the logistic capacity to drill with every student for multiple hours a day. I could focus on the stuff that really matters: rapidly improving my execution of skills that would be crucial in important debates the following year.
A major benefit of DebateDrills’ Online Debate Camp is that it was personalized. Working with DebateDrills allowed me to tailor the curriculum to my own needs, instead of arbitrarily being put into a group setting where debaters come from all parts of the country and have very different goals and needs. Because residential debate camps have such a diverse group of students in each "lab", they tend to focus on broad skills that will help every student in the lab, which is an inefficient method to teaching a competition like debate.”
All group camp activities occur on weekday evenings and weekends- please see schedule below for 2022 timings (all times in PST). Tutoring is scheduled at each family's convenience. Are you interested in working with us this Summer but these timings don't fit your schedule? Please get in touch and we can discuss accommodations.
The DebateDrills Online Summer Speech and Debate Camp is designed to help students rapidly accelerate their growth over the summer. Here’s a brief snapshot of the major offerings - click on a tab to learn more:
1-on-1 Tutoring
Group Based Learning (Labs)
Individualized Learning Assessment (ILA)
Elective Seminars
Guided Practice Rounds
Demo Debates
Professional Online Software and Seamless User Experience
Exclusive DebateDrills Resource Library
Curated Summer Slack
Curated Summer Dropbox & Camp Topic Starter Packets
Daily Office Hours
Virtual Camp-Wide Bonding Activities
Bonus Optional Activities
Our 2-Week Core Package is designed to provide learners with a challenging and comprehensive summer debate camp experience. The 2-Week and 3-Week Intensive Packages are designed for families interested in further individualization. We offer the following discounts:
1. Partial and Full Tuition Scholarships - families in need of financial assistance are encouraged to apply for our need-based scholarships.
2. Prior Customer Discount - all families who have previously purchased a DebateDrills service receive $100 off tuition.
3. Early Bird Discount - all families who register for camp prior to February 28th, 2022 receive $200 off tuition.
4. Referral Discount - all families who refer friends to camp receive $100 off tuition. Please see our FAQs below for more details regarding our referral policy.
Our 2-Week Core Package is designed to provide learners with a challenging and comprehensive summer debate camp experience. We offer the following discounts:
1. Partial and Full Tuition Scholarships - families in need of financial assistance are encouraged to apply for our need-based scholarships.
2. Prior Customer Discount - all families who have previously purchased a DebateDrills service receive $100 off tuition.
3. Early Bird Discount - all families who register for camp prior to February 1st, 2022 receive $200 off tuition.
4. Referral Discount - all families who refer friends to camp receive $100 off tuition. Please see our FAQs below for more details regarding our referral policy.
Our approach to debate education is informed by decades of practice, pedagogical research, and unprecedented success. All of our camp directors have graduated from prestigious undergraduate institutions and were top competitors. Paras received his Bachelors of Science at UC Berkeley and left a PhD in education to become a professional debate coach. Cameron received his J.D. at Yale Law School and left a career in law to do the same. They oversee the design of our curriculum and update it every year. DebateDrills' camp is defined by a commitment to providing each summer camper:
Individualized attention, feedback, and direction;
Graduate level understanding of academic topics;
Experience in learning from and practicing with recorded high-level debate rounds;
Technical mastery of even the most advanced skills.
We couple these commitments with an array of focus areas depending on student interest and debate events. Students should not have to sit through days of instruction they aren’t interested in. That’s why we have multiple debate “tracks” for students. We let the students’ interests dictate the field of study, and let our expertise dictate how that field is mastered. Click on an event below to explore what they entail!
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in traditional NSDA style debate circuits. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Rhetoric
Persuasion
Mastering Case Writing
Effective Rebuttal Speeches
Philosophy
Public Policy
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in progressive TOC style debate circuits. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Flowing
Spreading
Debate Strategy
Research
Foundations of Popular Strategies
Mastering Online Resources
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in sophisticated policy style argumentation. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Topicality
Conditionality
Theory Paradigm Issues
Counterplan theory
Weighing
Answering theory tricks
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in sophisticated critical style argumentation. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Topicality
Conditionality
Theory Paradigm Issues
Counterplan theory
Weighing
Answering theory tricks
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in sophisticated critical style argumentation. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Topicality
Conditionality
Theory Paradigm Issues
Counterplan theory
Weighing
Answering theory tricks
Students learn the foundational skills needed to excel in sophisticated critical style argumentation. Topics include:
KEY SKILLS:
Topicality
Conditionality
Theory Paradigm Issues
Counterplan theory
Weighing
Answering theory tricks
All of the above tracks will utilize an host of different techniques to maximize student learning, including but not limited to:
One-on-one tutoring
Analyzing high-level debates that focus on the topics in question
Weekly Seminars with Live Q&As
Customized content lectures
Campwide discussion and interaction on our Slack forum
Provision of topic files and materials so students can focus on learning, not researching
Unlike other summer debate camps, we orient our instruction, tutoring, and seminars using the previous season’s debate topics (especially the TOC topic). Each track has beginner, intermediate, and advanced versions, and depending on the students Individual Learning Assessment, we craft a strategy and plan of attack for each student custom to their needs.
Our approach to debate education is informed by decades of practice, pedagogical research, and unprecedented success. All of our camp directors have graduated from prestigious undergraduate institutions and were top competitors. Paras received his Bachelors of Science at UC Berkeley and left a PhD in education to become a professional debate coach. Cameron received his J.D. at Yale Law School and left a career in law to do the same. They oversee the design of our curriculum and update it every year. DebateDrills' camp is defined by a commitment to providing each summer camper:
Individualized attention, feedback, and direction;
Graduate level understanding of academic topics;
Experience in learning from and practicing with recorded high-level debate rounds;
Technical mastery of even the most advanced skills.
Our PF curriculum is designed by Morgan Swigert, who was the 2020 PF TOC Champion and Baker Cup Recipient, awarded annually to the most successful PF team in the United States. All skills are designed by pairs of staff members that are subject matter experts and edited extensively by Morgan. PF seminars include curated lectures that involve a lecture portion and a Q&A portion, followed by a selection of recommended drills to continue to develop the skill taught in the seminar. Labs focus on implementing these skills in a guided manner.
Core Skills and Seminars
Constructing a Killer Affirmative and Negative Constructive
Delivering Comprehensive Rebuttals
Giving Strong Summary Speeches
Leaving a lasting impression with the Final Focus Speech
Argument Comparison and Weighing
Debating Effectively in front of Parents
Elective Skills and Seminars
Crossfire
Drills
Prepping to win a tournament
Alternative framing
Tournament mindset
November-December topic area
January topic area
April topic area
Global economics
US foreign policy
Intro to Kritiks
Theory in Public Forum
Unlike other summer debate camps, we orient our instruction, tutoring, and seminars using the previous season’s debate topics (especially the TOC topic). Each track has beginner, intermediate, and advanced versions, and depending on the students Individual Learning Assessment, we craft a strategy and plan of attack for each student custom to their needs.
Can I choose which Lab I am placed in and who I tutor with?
My schedule is busy and I am unsure if I have time. How does scheduling work?
Can I attend both a residential debate camp and the DebateDrills Online Camp?
How many hours a day should I expect to work?
Can I choose what I learn this summer?
Do I have to be on the DebateDrills Debate Club Team to do the DebateDrills Online Debate Camp?
What age range is the camp best suited for?
Do you teach traditional debate?
How does the referral system work?
