No debate on Anjan Sahni
winning McMullan Award
It will be a relatively quiet summer for Anjan Sahni. Before heading
off to Yale Law School in the fall, he'll spend some time teaching high
school debate students in workshops at Emory and at Dartmouth College in
Hanover, N.H., but other than that he hopes to spend some time with his
family in Atlanta. Of course, if he gets bored, he'll have the means to
travel, as his work at Emory earned him the 1998 Lucius Lamar McMullan Award-and
the $20,000 that comes with it, no strings attached.
Sahni, who's spent his time at Emory debating in the Barkley Forum and
helping others do the same, deflects the credit for the McMullan Award.
"I feel really honored by the University, and I'm very appreciative
to a few professors in particular who've taken the time to mentor me and
advise me in making sound decisions while I've been here."
One of those professors, Barkley Forum director and forensics professor
Melissa Wade, wrote in her nomination letter for Sahni, "Anjan is one
of the best intercollegiate debaters by record in modern competitive history.
[And] he is excellent teacher for one so young. Anjan has a mature understanding
of teaching discipline and, while his sense of humor serves him well with
high school students and his peers, he has an appropriate distance that
increases his capacity to fully engage a student."
Sahni will put his debating skills to use in a career in law. He doesn't
know exactly what direction he'll take, but he'd like it to have an international
focus. And it probably will involve helping others, since he has quite a
bit of experience with that. In addition to tutoring Emory students in writing
and debating, Sahni helped form a debating team at Crim High School in Atlanta.
"What struck me [about Sahni] was not so much his wonder at conditions
in places like Crim, it was rather the confidence, openness and humor with
which he approached his work there," said political science associate
professor Richard Doner, who, along with department colleague David Davis,
are the other faculty members Sahni credited for the McMullan Award.
"I wish I were articulate enough to sing the praises I feel for
Anjan," Doner continued. "I feel privileged to have been part
of his education."
-Michael Terrazas
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