Monika Tshibanda
had the most wins on the team his sophomore year. Roberds began his coaching career in 2003 at Marshfield High School, growing the team of 3-4 students to over 70 in the near decade that he coached there. In 2011, Marshfield was the only school in the country that had two debate teams qualify as top 30 teams at the NCFL national tournament. Between 2012-17 he lived in Tucson and coached at a private high school that was a back-to-back state champion. In 2017-18 he coached at Amicitia American School in Fes, Morocco and was the director of debate for the country. At the 2018 high school national tournament in the U.S., his team from Morocco was the only school in the world to trophy in both middle school and high school policy debate, despite having most students who spoke English as a third or fourth language. “In debate, there are a lot of things that we can't control such as who our judges are, what our opponents will say or do, how talented our opponents are or how we are feeling. When we lose rounds because of those things, we just have to keep moving forward because there is nothing that we can do,” said Roberds. “However, there are a few things that we can control such as how much work we put in prior to the tournaments, how hard we practice and the type of effort that we give in rounds. When we do all of those things, the results will speak for themselves.” Looking to next season, the team plans to compete in 6-8 tournaments and Roberds is hopeful that one or two debaters will finish in the top 15-20 in the country for their division. They are also looking to add Mock Trial as a part of the team, which will increase the schedule with an additional 2-3 tournaments.
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