Student Profile: Aden Barton
350 words per minute.
That’s about the rate policy debaters present their arguments during a typical 90-minute to two-hour debate round. “People started researching more and more, and they wanted to get in more and more arguments. So they started talking faster,” Aden Barton (’20), half of one of the top debate duos in the country, explains. “I guess debate is pretty different than people think it is because it’s not really public speaking, as in it’s not just persuasion. It’s way more focused on research.” And MBA, Aden believes, is one of the most well-researched teams in the nation, a belief supported by the tournaments won this year already.
How does one become a part of the top debate team in the nation? For Aden it was not making another team. “I did soccer and tennis at my previous school, and when I came to MBA I was just planning on doing that. But I didn’t make the tennis team seventh grade year, so I did debate for a quarter and I really liked it.” He goes on to say that he almost signed up for soccer, but decided to stick with debate. “No looking back.”
It’s fun, Aden says, to learn about topics that might not be covered in class, but he acknowledges the amount of work that goes into being one of the best debaters in the country. Each summer the debaters go to a seven-week camp, where they are fully immersed in researching the year’s topic – chosen by the National Debate Association and National Debate Coaches Association. During the school year the demand is one to two hours of research every night. And during tournaments? “It’s debate all the time.”
But while much of what he loves is the actual debating, it is more so “being able to discuss interesting topics with other people that are like minded and similar to you, that you have fun hanging out with.” Aden acknowledges that debate has driven him into other pursuits that he may not have initially been drawn to, activities like Mock Trial, or contributing to The Bell Ringer. “I guess the lesson from that is not to discount something that you never knew before, or never tried.”
Click here to read more about MBA's Debate program featuring the number one ranked policy team in the nation.
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That’s about the rate policy debaters present their arguments during a typical 90-minute to two-hour debate round. “People started researching more and more, and they wanted to get in more and more arguments. So they started talking faster,” Aden Barton (’20), half of one of the top debate duos in the country, explains. “I guess debate is pretty different than people think it is because it’s not really public speaking, as in it’s not just persuasion. It’s way more focused on research.” And MBA, Aden believes, is one of the most well-researched teams in the nation, a belief supported by the tournaments won this year already.
How does one become a part of the top debate team in the nation? For Aden it was not making another team. “I did soccer and tennis at my previous school, and when I came to MBA I was just planning on doing that. But I didn’t make the tennis team seventh grade year, so I did debate for a quarter and I really liked it.” He goes on to say that he almost signed up for soccer, but decided to stick with debate. “No looking back.”
It’s fun, Aden says, to learn about topics that might not be covered in class, but he acknowledges the amount of work that goes into being one of the best debaters in the country. Each summer the debaters go to a seven-week camp, where they are fully immersed in researching the year’s topic – chosen by the National Debate Association and National Debate Coaches Association. During the school year the demand is one to two hours of research every night. And during tournaments? “It’s debate all the time.”
But while much of what he loves is the actual debating, it is more so “being able to discuss interesting topics with other people that are like minded and similar to you, that you have fun hanging out with.” Aden acknowledges that debate has driven him into other pursuits that he may not have initially been drawn to, activities like Mock Trial, or contributing to The Bell Ringer. “I guess the lesson from that is not to discount something that you never knew before, or never tried.”
Click here to read more about MBA's Debate program featuring the number one ranked policy team in the nation.
Montgomery Bell Academy
4001 Harding Road
Nashville, TN 37205
(615) 298-5514
