When Illinois High School Association (IHSA) announced that debate would be removed from its slate of state competitions due to a lack of participation, Elk Grove debate student Joey Alvarado was crushed.

“It is a really frustrating thing because it’s an amazing opportunity for kids to experience and just to go on a college campus for a weekend,” Alvarado said. “You’re still competing against the top individuals across the state and you get to see more people as well because it’s a different competition.”

While Elk Grove debate competitors continued their season in various tournaments around the area, the season did not feel the same for the team without having the stakes of the IHSA attached. Many of the senior students who were debate members since their freshman year — when competitions took place on Zoom — found a way to combat their fears of public speaking through the activity and found a community.

“I’ve gotten over my fear of public speaking, and then I made so many friends through debate,” senior Monica Johnston said. “I consider debate another family of mine, debate is so welcoming and such a fun time, even though we have to do research and go to tournaments. It is so worth it, because it’s so fun.”

The decision from the IHSA to cut the activity from its state-sponsored lineup was not an easy one, as IHSA assistant director Matt Troha said over the phone. The total number of schools participating in the activity fell below the 8 percent threshold required.

“Certainly from the debate community there was disappointment,” Troha said. “I think that there was an understanding going in just because of the number of participating schools and students has continued to drop and it was below the threshold that our rules allow.”

One of the groups that have tried making a change on this development was Outreach Debate, a non-profit organization that provides resources to students in lower-income communities and promotes debate programs.

But, he says they are now working toward ways to bring back debate into the competition.

“The plan now is to look towards our speech event and seeing if we could reincorporate a debate part of that in the future of the IHSA speech,” Troha said. 

Yug Mehta, a coordinator for Outreach Debate event started a petition to raise awareness about their cause to bring debate back to the statewide level.

“Lots of people go to IHSA State, and a tournament that represents Illinois is a big thing in debate,” Mehta said in a Zoom interview. “It has troubled many seniors and underclassmen that look forward to a way to showcase their talent at a big level.”

Only time and participation of debate will influence the decision to make this an IHSA competition.

Despite the news from last summer, Elk Grove debate competitors are charging ahead. Head coach Matt Bohnenkamp said that the competitors will miss the overnight trip to Bloomington for the state series.

“I think in some ways it doesn’t change change our season that much we will still have a state championship, we’ll still have competitions throughout the year, very similar to how we used to have had it before, just that end of season tournament for our handful of students that went each year,” Bohnenkamp said. “Usually we brought 5-10 students, which wasn’t our full team, so for those students the experience will be different. But overall, I don’t think it will change much for our team.”