The Debater’s Who’s Who includes a prestigious list of America’s well-known who have credited debate training with many of their life’s accomplishments, including Presidents Lyndon Johnson, John Kennedy and Richard Nixon, Vice-President Alben W. Barkley, Senator George McGovern, Harvard Law Professor Lawrence Tribe, broadcast journalist David Bloom, former House Representative Barbara Jordan, and media mogul Ted Turner. In his autobiography, Malcolm X credits debate training received while in prison with much of the success he attained as a respected leader after prison.

In addition to a list of debate notables, there is some fairly telling evidence on the value of academic debate. Businesses view debate training as an important skill when hiring. Many colleges and universities value debate in admissions policies. Numerous studies have demonstrated that debate improves academic success and success in life.

Debate improves three fundamental academic skills that translate very easily into a variety of learning environments. Debate teaches critical thinking, research, and presentation skills at profound levels. The ability to analyze and evaluate arguments and ideas carefully is vital in an information age. Few instructional methods teach comprehension, analysis, and evaluation as well as debate. The competitive motivation to do well while debating encourages students to think more clearly, research thoroughly, and prepare their remarks carefully. Once students have learned these fundamental skills, they become more proficient in another academic settings.

Competitive debate also increases knowledge of content. Debaters annually research thousands of books, academic journal articles, government documents, think tank reports, magazine and news articles on such broad topic areas as juvenile justice reform, anti-discrimination policy, environmental policy, trade issues, military commitments, and foreign relations. If students debate for four to eight years, they learn a great deal about public policy analysis, politics, economics and social issues.

Second, debate provides the opportunity for positive interaction with peers. Debate provides students with an opportunity to live together at debate institutes, to engage each other in social and personal issues in a safe and encouraging environment, and to know students from different schools, neighborhoods, and cultural backgrounds. The synergistic effect on the student is to broaden their opportunities to know students other than themselves while working together toward a common goal. A graduate of the Emory National Debate Institute once described the experience by saying, "While working on an argument together, I learned that we have a lot more in common than we have differences."

And finally, debate teaches students to understand the opinions of others. In modern debate, students engage in switch-side debating. They have to debate both sides of the same resolution. This aspect of debate alone makes the activity worthwhile, for students must come to learn their opponents’ strongest arguments. They must learn these arguments both to defend them and to argue against them. Debate teaches students to appreciate the opinion of others and to disagree with others with respect.