# US Universities Debating Championship

The US Universities Debating Championship (USUDC) is the largest British Parliamentary debating tournament in the United States, and one of the largest debate tournaments in the world. The event is held for college and university students attending school in the United States, and is hosted by a different university each year. The host is selected by the member schools of the US Universities Debate Association. The event determines the National Champions for the year.
Most recently the tournament was hosted by Dartmouth College in March 2025. The current National Champions are Tejas Subramaniam and Elizabeth Li from Stanford University. The Novice (first year) division was won by Clement Tsao and John Wu from the University of Pennsylvania.

## Format

USUDC is held in a format based on the World Universities Debating Championship. The tournament is held in April, before most American colleges hold their final exams. In recent years about 180 teams have competed at the tournament. Since 2015, only students registered at an American college or university may compete in playoff rounds and be made National Champion, but students from foreign schools can still compete. Before 2015, foreign schools were allowed to compete in playoffs, resulting in a 2012 championship where separate tournament champions and national champions were crowned.
Each team consists of two students from the same college or university. In a given debate they will compete against three other teams simultaneously. A motion, or proposition, is given to the teams fifteen minutes before the debate. Two teams are assigned to defend the motion while the other two teams are to oppose it. The teams are judged by a panel of judges, who rank them from first place to fourth place based on respective contributions and assign scores to each person based on the quality of their speech. In a debate, teams typically go against teams with a similar record as themselves, based on a scoring system where coming first, second, third, or fourth in a round is awarded with progressively fewer points. For example, if a team had six points after three rounds, then they would expect to compete against other teams with six points in the fourth round.
After six or eight preliminary rounds there is a "break," announced at the banquet on the second day, where the top thirty-two teams progress to the third day. On day three, rounds are elimination rounds, where the bottom two teams in a round do not progress. Rounds progress through octofinals, then quarterfinals, semifinals, and finals, where the National Champion is named. Seeding for octofinals is based on the cumulative points the team had at the end of preliminary rounds.
Novices, teams consisting of students in their first year of collegiate debate, have a separate break to novice quarterfinals or semifinals should they not make the open octofinals. A subsequent novice final then crowns the Novice Champion.

### Scoring system

In contrast with most major BP tournaments, such as WUDC, USUDC is notable in that since 2020 it has used a tapered scoring system awarding different multiples of the "3, 2, 1, 0" point scheme depending on the round. For instance, in some preliminary rounds first place receives six points, second place receives four points, third place receives two points, and fourth place receives none, whereas in other rounds, first receives three points, second, two, third, one, and fourth, zero. This system seeks to remedy an inherent flaw in the standard BP points and matchup system, formally analyzed in a 2020 paper by Barnes et. al:
   Because of the scoring in BP, teams competing in lower rooms often score enough points to advance on the tab above a large number of teams who were competing in higher rooms. This leap-frogging over other teams in higher rooms is widely acknowledged, though people may not fully understand how disruptive this is to getting an accurate ordering on the tab.
The problem of sorting teams based on skill in order to generate a fair break is compared by the authors to the Brazil nut effect, where the largest nuts in a package of mixed nuts rise to the top of the container during transport because of shaking. Laboratory experiments have shown that shaking equally vigorously throughout the process is less efficient than gradually decreasing the vigorousness over time, because applying as much force at a nearly-sorted state as was used initially ends up disrupting the sort. Barnes et al.'s analysis shows that this phenomenon is similarly present in standard BP scoring, and that many different tapered scoring systems, where the amount of points awarded decreases each preliminary round, significantly outperform the standard equal round point system in producing skill-accurate breaks.

## US Universities Debate Association

The US Universities Debate Association (USUDA) is the body which governs USUDC. It was founded in 2013 in order to organize the British Parliamentary debate circuit in the United States. They select the host for the next USUDC each year. Membership in the USUDA is open to all colleges and universities in the United States.

## Tournaments by Year

Harvard has won the Championship five times, Yale, Stanford and Princeton twice, and no other school more than once. In 2018, Harvard became the first school to successfully defend the title. In 2023, Xiao-ke Lu became the first person to win the Championship more than once.
| Year | Host Institution | National Champion | Finalist Teams | Top Speaker |
| 2025 | Dartmouth College | Tejas Subramaniam & Elizabeth Li, Stanford University | Manav Mittal & Manuel Machorro, Bates College; Ambika Grover & Stephanie Chen, Harvard University; Molly Callaghan & Catherine Liu, Harvard University | Tejas Subramaniam, Stanford University |
| 2023 | Hobart and William Smith Colleges | Jacquelynn Lin & Xiao-ke Lu, Princeton University | Matt Mauriello & Annushka Agarwal, Harvard University; Muzamil Godil & Justin Wu, Johns Hopkins University; Kaustubh Jain & Sheryar Ahmad, Princeton University | Xiao-ke Lu, Princeton University |
| 2022 | Hobart and William Smith Colleges | Arthur Lee & Tejas Subramaniam, Stanford University | Jane Mentzinger & Greg Weaving, Princeton University; Matt Song & Michael Ning, Yale University; Rohan Kapoor & Benny Nicholson, University of Chicago | Greg Weaving, Princeton University & Tejas Subramaniam, Stanford University |
| 2021 | University of Pennsylvania | Canceled |
| 2020 | Hobart and William Smith Colleges | Xiao-ke Lu & Greg Weaving, Princeton University | Jay Gibbs & Jaewan Park, University of Chicago; Devesh Kodnani & Brian Li, University of Chicago; Preston Johnston & Shreyas Kumar, Princeton University | Anish Welde, University of Pennsylvania |
| 2019 | Clemson University | Jenny Jiao & Salil Mitra, Duke University | Aditya Dhar & Michel Nehme, Harvard University; Ko Lyn Cheang & Lorenzo Pinasco, Yale University; Harry Meadows & Abby Westberry, Bates College | Ko Lyn Cheang, Yale University |
| 2018 | Stanford University | Vedant Bahl & Mars He, Harvard University | Benjamin Muschol & Will Smith, Northeastern University; Harry Elliott & Bobbi Leet, Stanford University; William Arnesen & Charlie Barton, Yale University | Harry Elliott, Stanford University |
| 2017 | Regis University & University of Denver | Archie Hall & Alex Wu, Harvard University | David Slater & Elana Leone, Stanford University; Harry Elliot & Bobbi Leet, Stanford University; Daniel Stoyell & Rebecca Blair, Cornell University | Zoë Seaman-Grant, Bates College |
| 2016 | Morehouse College | Drew Latimer & Jeremy Chen, Tufts University | Dhruva Bhat & Danny DeBois, Harvard University; Evan Lynyak & Henry Zhang, Yale University; Harry Elliott & Taahir Munshi, Stanford University | Harry Elliott, Stanford University |
| 2015 | University of Alaska, Anchorage | Tony Nguyen & Edwin Zhang, Yale University | Tiffany Keung & Alex Mechanick, Brown University; Fanele Mashwama & Bo Seo Harvard University; Rodjé Malcolm & Emanuel Waddell, Morehouse College | Matt Summers, Bates College |
| 2014 | Purdue University | Taylor Blackburn & Jac Stewart, Bates College | Kirat Singh & Srinath Reddy, Cornell University; Colin Etnire & Krikor Kouyoumdjian, Loyola Marymount University; Michael Barton & Sam Ward-Packard, Yale University | Michael Barton, Yale University & Sam Ward-Packard Yale University |
| 2013 | University of La Verne | Ben Kornfeld & Sam Ward-Packard, Yale University | Chris Axtman & Megan Towles, Carroll College; Colin Etnire & Dearv O’Crowley Loyola Marymount University; Emma Pierson & Andrew Suciu, Stanford University | Ben Kornfeld, Yale University |
| 2012 | Willamette University | Tournament Champions: Christine Simpson & Michael O’Dwyer, University College Dublin; National Champions: Buzz Klinger & Will McConnell, Hobart and William Smith Colleges | Maxwell Dovala & Kate Falkenstein, Yale University; Kamya Chandra & Nipun Mahajan, St. John's University | Sam Ward-Packard, Yale University |
| 2011 | University of Vermont | Cormac Early & Jo Box, Harvard University | Sarah Carpenter & Amie Stanley, University of Alaska, Anchorage; Maxwell Dovala & Kate Falkenstein, Yale University; Angela Kintominas & David Maher, University of New South Wales | Cormac Early, Harvard University |
| 2010 | Regis University & University of Denver | Charlie Sprague & Jesse Katz-Blumenthal, Claremont Colleges | Aaron Baker & Lindsay Bing, Portland State University; Alex Campbell & Anish Mitra, Stanford University; Nate Blevins & Naz El-Khatib, Yale University | Colin Haughey, University of Alaska, Anchorage |
| 2009 | University of Vermont | Lewis Bollard & Ben Belser, Harvard University | Mike Aguilera & Kevin Kiley, Loyola Marymount University; Robert Embree & Monica Ferris, Hart House; Doug Cochran & Daniel Warrents, Middle Temple | Daniel Warrents, Middle Temple |
| 2008 | Portland State University | Alexander Schwab & Kevin Kiley, Loyola Marymount University | Charles Sprague & Kari Wohlschlegel, Claremont Colleges; Rob Ruiz & Thomas Allison, University of La Verne; Michael Imeson & James Kilcup, Seattle University | Kari Wohlschlegel Claremont Colleges |
| 2007 | Claremont McKenna College | Josh Martin & Rob Ruiz, University of La Verne | Matt Contreras & Courtney Crooks, Loyola Marymount University; Dan Adler & Eric Sanelle, Portland State University; Brian Kettles and Julie Liztwan, University of Alberta & University of Calgary | Julia Liztwan, University of Alberta |
| 2006 | Claremont McKenna College | Samuel Myat San & Alexander Schwab, Harvard University | Tom Lassen & Chris Kolerok, University of Alaska, Anchorage; Adam Chilton & David Denton, Yale University, Chris Jones & Monica Ferris, Athabasca University | David Denton, Yale University |
| 2005 | Claremont McKenna College | Michael Rose & Tom Lassen, University of Alaska, Anchorage | Chris Kolerok & Rose Helens-Hart, University of Alaska, Anchorage; Martin Pinnes & Daniel Streim, Colgate University; Ashish Sinha & Michael Ferris, University of British Columbia | Josh Martin, University of La Verne |