New Study Shows Urban Debate's Educational Benefits

From Scott Deatherage:

I am writing to share with you new groundbreaking peer-reviewed research that shows that participation in an Urban Debate League (UDL) significantly increases students’ chances of graduating from high school and performing at or above college-ready benchmarks on the ACT’s Reading and English subject-matter tests. This research was published this week in a special issue of the Journal of Negro Education and was conducted by Dr. Briana Mezuk of Virginia Commonwealth University and researchers at the University of Michigan, in conjunction with the Chicago Public Schools and the Consortium on Chicago School Research at the University of Chicago. It retrospectively examines ten years of the Chicago Debate League.

Dr. Mezuk’s research suggests the effectiveness of urban debate programs. The findings show that debate boosts student achievement in low-performing schools when compared to similar students who did not participate in urban debate. Dr. Mezuk found that the educational benefits of participation in urban debate were even more pronounced for African American males.

The research team found that among African American male students, debaters were 70 percent more likely to graduate from high school, three times less likely to drop out, 50 percent more likely to reach the ACT college-readiness benchmark for English, and 70 percent more likely to reach the ACT benchmark for Reading than non-debaters, even after accounting for 8th grade achievement.

The NAUDL is sharing Dr. Mezuk’s study with the launch of its online Evidence Center, which serves as a central location for educators, school officials, policymakers, and institutional supporters to access information and resources on the educational benefits of competitive policy debate for urban students.

The Evidence Center is located at:
http://www.urbandebate.org/urbandebateworks.shtml.

We also have a set of issue briefs on the role debate can play in addressing specific educational challenges, such as graduation rates, secondary literacy, turning around the lowest performing schools, college and career readiness, and implementing the Common Core Standards. These can be found at: http://www.urbandebate.org/policyandpractice.shtml.

We hope you will explore this new research for yourself. Dr. Mezuk’s research is the most comprehensive study of urban debate to date, and we are excited about these results. If you have questions, please contact the NAUDL’s Chief Academic Officer, Dr. Eric Tucker, at erictucker@urbandebate.org or (312) 771-1816.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sincerely,

Scott Deatherage
Executive Director
NAUDL