Summer Academic Enrichment Eligible Programs

Goals

This camp provides a well-rounded range of speech & debate education to the middle school student who wants to experience a little bit of everything.

In Policy Debate, students will learn about and debate important topics relevant to their lives while gaining communication, reasoning, and public speaking skills. Debate is a way to learn to disagree in a healthy and productive way centered around reasoning and evidence! If you like to argue, ponder, question, or just learn something new, then this camp is for you! Students will learn the fundamentals of policy debate and learn about the topic area for competitive debate in the 2023-24 school year.

At Congressional Debate Camp, your student will learn to successfully debate with civility in an academic setting and gain the soft skills necessary to build consensus among people with diverse opinions after attending middle school congressional debate camp. Each day students will learn strategies and best practices to help them grow as empathic listeners who can adapt messages to meet the needs of diverse audiences. Students will also learn how to respond to and successfully refute opposing arguments. After attending MDAW’s middle school congressional debate camp, students will be prepared to excel in academic courses in which they need to research, write, present, and defend positions.

Students in 5-8th grade with or without speech experience are invited to participate in Middle School Speech Camp- Oral Interp Focus! Your student will become an effective and confident public speaker after attending. This camp is for students who are interested in Speech Interp events. Is your student interested in theatre or acting? This is a great way to build their confidence and skill set. Students will learn the basics of identifying a narrative arc, how to identify strategies for internalization and externalization of character traits in their acting choices, and write an introduction to frame an acting performance.

Activities

There will be minimal content overlap between the three camps, and students will be able to build on the skills learned at a previous camp. Policy, Congress, and Speech camp will all use a mix of lectures, fun games and exercises, and low-stakes speaking in small groups to build their confidence. The final day of each camp culminates with a mock tournament. In Policy Debate, students compete in mock rounds with a partner; in Congress, students participate in a mock Congress session; and in Speech, students will perform their favorite event category in front of an audience in a mini tournament format.

Program Dates

Wednesday July 5 – Saturday July 8 9 AM-4 PM

Can students reside on campus? No

Can students commute to campus? Yes

Can students take online classes? No