As they speak, the room quiets, listening intently to the opening arguments of the two groups of debaters. The judges sit back and take notes as they listen to see which group presents the best arguments and evidence.

Xhoel Veizi, Div. 677, and Abdu Hytrek, Div. 771, were two of the best in the country this year.

For the first time in its 20 years of existence, Lane’s Debate Team made it to the National Tournament of Champions (TOC) at the University of Kentucky, with Veizi and Hytrek representing Lane.

The duo won four out of seven rounds — a “positive” record — at the TOC and placed 36th in the nation.

Just qualifying for the TOC is an “unheard of” accomplishment, according to Assistant Coach Ms. Sears — in order to qualify, Veizi and Hytrek had to make it to the final stages of two highly competitive national “bid” tournaments, one in Niles, Ill. and one in Iowa.  

Only four teams from Chicago qualified to go: two teams from Whitney Young and one team from Walter Payton.

Veizi and Hytrek also won the varsity city championship, which is the first time Lane has won varsity “cities” since 2008.

Veizi first participated in debate as a freshman.

He came to Mr. Fine, the head coach of the debate team, four days before the team’s first tournament during his freshman year.

“I came just as the cut-offs were happening, so it was nice of Fine to take me in so late,” Veizi  said.

In one early competition, Veizi had no partner, but was still allowed to debate in the preliminary rounds by himself, as a “Maverick,” Fine said.

He competed in five rounds and won all of them.

“My first year I was put into a novice division, which is where you go against first year students,” Veizi said. “It was definitely a really hard activity to adapt to. I thought it would just be two students arguing, but there are finer points to that. People talk really fast and that’s something you have to adapt to.”

Every summer, Veizi has gone to a debate camp at Northwestern for seven weeks, showing his devotion to becoming an expert debater. During his junior year, he was one of the top students on the debate team. Veizi won Best Speaker award at the city championship this year as well.

“At the beginning, it was pretty nerve-wracking, just because I never liked speaking in front of audiences,” Veizi said. “After over two hundred rounds, it’s something you get used to.”

Like Veizi, Hyrtek started as a freshman. Fine recognized Hytrek’s potential in his freshman English class.

“He came out of the gate running,” Fine said. “I knew what a superstar he was just from just how spectacular he was in my English class.”

Hytrek tried out his freshman year.

“I always liked arguing and fighting with people, so to do it academically and competitively sounded good to me,” Hytrek said.

He received a first place speaker award during the summer debate camp and won the tournament hosted by the camp. As a freshman, Hytrek won the Novice tournament for Chicago cities and Illinois states. Last summer, he went to the University of California-Berkeley to attend a summer camp, where he improved his debating skills.

This is Hytrek’s second year as a debater, and Fine said he’s “never seen a second year debater so successful.”

Hytrek won the JV Illinois state championship this year, and he’s one of the first debaters ever to win both Novice and JV at the state level.

“He still has one more year with us and he’s very motivated to go to Berkeley again this summer and go to the TOC again next year,” Fine said. “It’s really inspiring for everyone to see his success.”

Hytrek and Veizi have been a power team ever since they became partners. They are also on good terms with each other outside the debate room.

“Xhoel is like my best friend,” Hytrek said. “We’re really close. I think we fit really well. Sometimes we get into arguments, but it’s good that way.”

 The debate team has really shone this past year, Fine said. All the members have gotten closer over the past year as they practice together and attend tournaments.

“The greatest thing about debate is that I get to work with these kids year after year, and by the time their seniors, we really do become a family,” Fine said.

 Fine has been an English teacher at Lane for five years, teaching one section of Honors Argument and Debate, which is in connection to the Lane Debate Team. There are three levels of classes: Honors Argument and Debate 1, 2, and 3.

As a young adult, Fine was unsure of his aspirations for the future. But as he went to college, he discovered what he was good at, which was English.

“My parents asked me what subject I liked the most, and I always loved English,” Fine said. “As I studied English, I noticed that everything else I was doing had something to do with helping people, another passion of mine.”

Before he was a teacher, he was a camp counselor during the summer and a dance instructor for little kids. As he continued his college education he realized that he could combine his love of kids and English, and that was through teaching.

After his second year of teaching and being an assistant coach, Fine became the head debate coach.

Ms. Sears, a first year teacher and the assistant debate coach, teaches AP Literature and Survey Literature. She combined her love of kids and English and decided to become a teacher.

“I always loved English and I also really liked kids,” Sears said. “ I worked at summer camps a lot and it was something I really liked.”

As a high school student, Sears was part of the debate team, and it fueled her passion to continue it in the future.

“It was something that changed my life for the better,” Sears said. “I learned things that I would’ve never learned in the classroom through debate, and that’s why I wanted to coach debate here. There was no way I was going to work at a high school and not be a part of the debate team.”

Debate requires an extensive commitment of time, dedication and resources. Students meet two weekends a month and every day after school, and the team attends nearly 20 tournaments per year.

According to Fine, for every tournament that the debate team attends, Lane has to pay for the buses, food, supplies, judges, and more.

“The challenges with debate is that it is a very expensive activity, and it’s really important to Lane that no student has to pay,” Fine said.

Fine said that the team tries to limit the number of students to 30. Ten new debaters are recruited each year, and 20 return. Students are recruited from freshman year and then grow as they go up a grade level.

“Almost all of our debaters start freshman year and continue on as sophomores, novice debaters, juniors, JV debaters, and seniors, Varsity debaters,” Fine said.  Every debater on the team sticks with it throughout all of high school and continue to grow. The kids learn, grow, and teach each other.”

Each level of debate comes with different responsibilities. Students in Debate 3 are expected to teach the younger students, while the younger students in Debate 1 are expected to listen and take the knowledge learned from their older companions.

“Every year that I’ve coached, we’ve gotten better and better,” Fine said. “We always perform really well in the city circuit, but we also compete at the state level and the national level. We’ve won cities, states, and this year, for the first time, Veizi and Hytrek got to nationals. That’s never happened in the history of Lane Tech.”