Ole Miss Debate Team Shines at National Championship Tournament

At the conclusion of a season full of wins, two Ole Miss students finished second in the novice division final round of the Yaatly Online Debate League national championship tournament at California Polytechnic State University.

"There were impressive accomplishments all around, but the highlight was freshmen Kadin Collier and Loria Williams reaching the final round of the novice division," said Jacob Justice, director of the Warren Debate Union and assistant professor of speech communication.

"This tournament featured Kadin and Loria's third appearance in a final round during the 2024-25 season, capping off the most successful season by Ole Miss freshmen debaters since at least 2021."

Students in the union include:

• Kadin Collier, a freshman international studies and Arabic major from Hattiesburg
• Ainsley Corwin, a senior majoring in art, classics and mathematics from Lake Ozark, Missouri
• Thomas "Taf" Flanders, a sophomore public policy leadership major from Vicksburg
• Shea Graham, a junior philosophy and psychology major from Laurel
• Jessica Johnson, a junior journalism major from Diamondhead
• Gracie Roberts, a junior management information systems major from Clinton
• Edoardo Santopuoli, a sophomore political science major from Memphis, Tennessee
• Jacob Smith, a senior secondary education major from Lacey, Washington
• Clayton Wilhorn, a sophomore public policy leadership major from Biloxi
• Loria Williams, a freshman international studies and Spanish major from Madison
• Edward Wilson, a sophomore public policy leadership major from Jackson.

Overall, the students competed in 238 rounds of debate across 10 tournaments during the season.

Johnson and Smith earned two No. 1 rankings at an earlier tournament in Nashville. The team also placed in the top four of the tournament's open division.

"I'm a senior, so it was one of my last tournaments ever," Smith said. "As soon as I hit that final round, I realized we did it. Seeing my coaches' proud faces, it felt like something I would never forget."

Collier, Graham, Johnson and Smith also finished as semifinalists at the Rocky Mountain Debating Championship in October. Roberts and Corwin finished as finalists in the Wheaton College tournament in September.

Teams do not know which topics they will debate before a tournament, Justice said. So, each debater familiarizes themselves with topics that could be potential competition subjects, including social media, economics, military policy, globalization, drug and gambling legalization, and artificial intelligence.

"For our students, the debate team is the equivalent of taking a few more credit hours of classes each semester," he said. "This semester, the teams have been meeting two or three times a week and some students are doing much more than that."

Being involved in debate helps students develop a variety of skills that can help prepare them for careers, Justice said.

"Debate helps you express yourself and organize your thoughts, but it also makes you think," he said. "It's really easy these days to get locked into one side of a story, to get sorted into an echo chamber where all your viewpoints are reinforced by what the algorithm gives you.

"The beauty of debate is we take controversial topics and ask the students to argue in favor of positions that are different from their own. It helps you think outside of your echo chamber and just be a more well-rounded person."

For Johnson, debate was a way to overcome her fear of public speaking.

"When you're up there, you can feel everybody's eyes on you," she said. "This really helped me get over that nervous part of me. I think a lot of people have those fears, and joining debate helps because you have people who have been there before.

"We're in the kind of group where everybody has sucked at this at least once. You're going to make mistakes, but everybody has made mistakes."

Neither Smith nor Johnson competed in debate in high school – which is common for the Warren Debate Union, Justice said. Instead, both took a chance on a team meeting in their freshman year and found something they are passionate about.

"Debate has shown me why you need to get involved on campus," Smith said. "There are a billion organizations out there at the University of Mississippi, and there's not enough time to explore them all.

"But you don't have to explore all of them to find the group of people you're closest to."

Top: Members of the Ole Miss Warren Debate Union gather to compete at the 2025 Yaatly Online Debate League national championship tournament at California Polytechnic State University. The tournament capped off a successful season that saw the UM team regarded as one of the nation's top debate squads. Submitted photo