East meets West in an upcoming debate hosted by the TCU Forensics Team. The team is excited to welcome Masaya Sasaki and Naruhiko Nakano, national champion debaters from Japan.
In a two-on-two parliamentary- style debate, members of the TCU team will face-off against the Japanese debaters on a resolution of global energy policy. The event is sponsored by the Academy of Tomorrow and the Bob Schieffer College of Communication.
Members of the community are encouraged to join us on Thursday, February 25, at 7 p.m. for a public debate. It will be hosted in the Mary Couts Burnett Library Reading Room at TCU.
Meet the debaters
Masayak Sasaki is a second-year debater on the parliamentary-style debate team at the University of Tokyo Debating Society. Although he had no previous experience in debating, he has won many prizes in national and international debate tournaments. Most recently, he was a Semi-Finalist at the English Speaking Union of Japan national tournament 2015 and at the Asian Debate Institute tournament 2015. Sasaki said that above all, he loves debating. He loves speaking in public, especially in English.
Naruhiko Nakano is on the policy debate team at Mie University E.S.S. He started the policy debate two and a half years ago, in his first year at the university. During his junior year he won the first team prize from NDAJ X FIDL tournament that decided the strongest team in western Japan. After that, he became the eighth debater and got the eighth team prize from the National debate tournament. Now he supports small teams as a member of NAFA, the largest and best-known debate organization in Japan. He said he loves debating and wants to improve his debate skills further.
Colten Meisner and Shelby Whitson will represent the TCU Forensics Team for the public debate.
Colten Meisner is a third year student at Texas Christian University, where he studies in the Bob Schieffer College of Communication and the John V. Roach Honors College. Colten has over seven years of experience in competitive debate and public address. During his time with TCU Forensics, Colten has garnered national awards in extemporaneous speaking and impromptu speaking and has won several invitational titles in parliamentary debate. Colten is a member of Pi Kappa Delta and competes at a national level for both the American Forensic Association and the National Forensic Association.
Shelby Whitson is the Vice President of TCU Forensics. She will graduate in May with a major in political science and minor in journalism. In her third year competing with the team Shelby participates in a myriad of events. She is consistently awarded top speaker in Parliamentary Debate at invitational tournaments across the country. She has also experienced success in the events of extemporaneous speaking and impromptu speaking. In addition to forensics, Shelby is the politics & public affairs editor for the109 news in Fort Worth, the communications executive for the TCU Young Americans for Freedom, the academics chair for TX Delta Pi Beta Phi and the associate producer and broadcaster for a news show on 88.7 The Choice. Shelby is a member of the Political Science honor society, Pi Sigma Delta, the communications honor society Lambda Pi Eta, and the Pi Kappa Delta debate society.
Members of TCU’s faculty and staff are also welcome to join us in the Scharbauer Hall Debate Chamber on Wednesday, February 24, at 11:30 a.m. for a private debate. Please RSVP to a.hinderaker@tcu.edu for this event.
Debaters for this afternoon debate will be Colten Meisner and Timothy Betts.
Timothy Betts is a Junior pursuing a Philosophy and Economics double degree here at TCU. Timothy is also the President and Extemporaneous Speaking Chairperson for the TCU Forensics team and a member of the John V. Roach Honors College. As a member of the TCU Forensics team he has won numerous awards including Superior and Excellent awards at the 2015 Pi Kappa Delta National Convention and a number of individual tournament champion awards. Timothy typically competes in Extemporaneous Speaking, Impromptu Speaking, Informative, After Dinner Speaking, Poetry and Program Oral Interpretation, and Rhetorical Criticism.