TOC, breaking, cutting cards — it’s all nonsense to most people, but to Lane debaters it is the language that they know and love.

After an extremely successful 2015- 16 season which led to a bid in the National “Tournament of Champions,” Lane’s debate team is hoping to continue on with another successful season.

Lane’s debate team is comprised of 36 debaters, 10 varsity (typically seniors), 16 junior varsity (typically juniors) and 10 novice (typically sophomores with the occasional fresh- man). In each level, people are paired off, meaning Lane’s debate team has 18 teams within their teams.

They compete in 19 tournaments each year, ranging from city tournaments against other CPS schools to larger national tournaments against schools from every part of the country. They are part of the Regional Circuit Conference in the Chicago Debate League.

So far this season, the Debate Team has already competed in three tournaments. Hayward Blake, Lindsay McFayden, Abdu Hytrek and Lily Craelius broke into Octofinals at the Sept. 9 Niles Township National Conference Varsity Invitational. Additionally, Craelius and Hytrek broke into Double Octofinals at New Trier National Conference Varsity Invita- tional on Oct. 8.

At the city level, Novice’s Jaden Kiykendahl and Aster Smith broke into finals of the first Chicago Debate League tournament at Northside. Craelius and Hytrek broke into finals at the Varsity level as well, with Smith and Hytrek both taking first place speaker awards at their respectivelevels.

Each member had their own reason for joining the team. Novice debater Isaiah Meadows, Div.964, wanted to continue on from a similar program he started in elemen- tary school. “It was like debate but less verbal stuff,” Meadows said. “I wanted to work on my verbal skills.”

JV debater Emayli Holmes, Div. 953, felt that it was her way to make a change in the world. “I have always thought that all the problems have come through the government,” she said. “This was my way of seeing how I could be someone that could solve problems, and be a more eloquent speaker and go on and change the future.”

Varsity debater Lily Craelius, Div 768, joined for a much different reason. “During my freshman year, I was hella depressed because there was nothing happening and I realized I had three years in front of me,” Craelius said. “All my classes [freshman year] were in rooms that didn’t have windows; the debate room was the first room that I came into that had win- dows, and I felt instantly happy when I walked into that room, so that was the only reason I tried out.”

Craelius’s story of finding a place where she belonged is what inspired Head Coach Mr. Fine to get involved in debate.

“What I found is that what the kids needed most was a coach who creates a team. And that’s what I’m most passionate about, creating a family,” Fine said

Fine was drawn to debate ever since he started teaching at Lane. His first exposure to the debate team was by student teaching under the debate coach at the time Ms. Mason.

“While I was student teaching, I saw the debaters come in all the time,” Fine said. “It felt like Ms. Mason’s classroom was almost like their second home.”

After being hired at Lane, Mason asked Fine to join the team as an assistant coach. After one year of being the assistant coach, he was promoted to head coach.

Although Fine had no previous experience in debate, he felt that his theatre background would help him.

“A lot of the skills I learned in theatre can be applied to debate,” he said. “There is a performance aspect to debate.”

Fine said some of his own attributes also lent him to being successful in the debate field. “I’m definitely a stubborn person who always thinks that I’m right,” he said.

English teachers Ms. Sears and Mr. Locke are assistant coaches, and the team has two external coaches as well.

Everyone who is on the debate team is enrolled in Honors Argument and Debate every year that they are on the team. The class is a way for coaches and debate team members to have a structure and constant time they are able to work together every day, so they have almost an hour of guaranteed practice every day.

Fine described the class as collaborative and self-directed, with everyone helping each other out and working to create a better team and a family atmosphere.

“No teacher tells you to do work, but you want to do what you have to do [to be successful],” Holmes said.

Debate is extremely competitive to get on at Lane, according to Fine, with around 100 students trying out for 12 spots last year. Debaters go through a tryout process that involves multiple practice debates and testing communication and speaking skills. ”We’re looking for someone who can

speak well, think fast and is assertive, but we’re also looking for someone who can fit into our community,” Fine said. “The number one quality [in a debater] is a good vibe.”

Debate encompasses many topics, and debaters ultimately choose what they debate. Some of the more popular topics are theoretical literature and black theory.

“I like to debate queer pessimism, that’s like what I what I want to de- bate. Stuff about gender and sexuality,” Holmes said.

“I like to talk about black people,” Craelius said. “That’s how I win most of the things I do. I talk about how black people aren’t treated the same and that’s a problem.”

One of Fine’s main goals as a coach is to create a family atmosphere for the team.

“The JV acts as moms and dads for the debabies,” Fine said. “We say we have a debate family, with 36 different flavors of ice cream on our team.”

“They’re my parents,” Craelius said of her coaches.

Craelius and Hytrek have had their own levels of success in debate. In addition to Hytrek making it to the Tournament of Champions, both were invited to the UC Berkeley and New School NYC Round Robin Invitation- al in New York City in February. This is due to their their debate success and commitment to questions of identity, justice and power in their arguments, according to Fine.

Even with the debate team’s recent success, Fine wants to keep his team grounded.

“Winning is having fun, and that’s what really is most important to me — that the debate team has fun,” Fine said.