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Juan Simon Angel is a rising third-year at the University of Chicago, studying Human Rights and Latin American and Caribbean Studies. He’s originally from Columbia, but did most of his schooling in south Georgia where he participated in impromptu speaking and congressional debate all four years of high school. He first found debate through his school’s open house: “...it was one of the few clubs that were not sports-related, that seemed interesting…and I had a really bad accent, so I was like ‘Oh, why not?’”
Article by Chloe Chiles Troutman
He remembers being terrified at his first tournament, which he jokes that he “never stopped being” through his debate career. He said “I was nervous in general, obviously as your first tournament, but it was also because we had to drive four hours, five hours in a bus - it was one of my first overnight school trips.” The adventure was exciting, but nerve-wracking due to the preparation leading up to his first event. He had looked “over the case a thousand times, done all the research, done everything, but the thing about debate is it just matters how much [you] practice.” Despite his nerves, what kept him grounded was his team. He had a group of 12 to 13 other students that encouraged each other and celebrated each other’s successes.
This feeling of shared success was not just relegated to his schoolmates, but extended to the friends he made from different schools at tournaments along the way. “There was a lot of comradery, because you know, we’re kids…people who I would compete against, after it would be like ‘You did so well!’ ‘I love your debate outfit’ type of stuff” he laughs. Juan Simon told me that he still interacts with friends on social media from all over Georgia, that he met from tournaments. However, he admits that “there were also some schools that…only stuck to their teammates. They were there to compete.” There were schools with teams of 50 people, where debate was clearly more popular, emphasized, and well-funded. Juan Simon recalls being able to tell which students had the opportunity to attend speech and debate camps, and had multiple debate coaches, while others did not.
Despite not having the biggest team and coming from an underfunded school, Juan Simon qualified for the national speech and debate tournament all four years which he received an award for his senior year, as well as receiving a ‘Student of the Year’ award for his district. His favorite memory from debate was qualifying for nationals his first year and traveling to Dallas by coach bus for 12 hours. This might sound like a grueling trip to some, but for Juan Simon hanging out with his friends and trying In ‘N Out for the first time made it worth it. Then, at the tournament he got to meet amazing people from all fifty states, but his trips to Atlanta metropolitan-area tournaments prepared him for this, and he felt like he was competing in Georgia again. While he didn’t win a national title, competing on a national stage was reward enough for the long journey he had.
Reflecting on what speech and debate has taught him, he attributes these experiences to his ability to defend himself and conduct research. He thinks “having the ability to express myself when needed, the way I see things” has come in handy in his academic career. As a Human Rights major, expressing himself about human rights issues is a skill he uses everyday inside and outside the classroom. He is able to back up his assertions with evidence, which he finds using the same research skills that he would use for a case or speech. This research about topics he wouldn’t typically look up on his own has also fed into his need to stay curious, a skill that has supported his interest in learning new languages. Juan Simon’s first language is Spanish, and his second English, but he is also proficient in Portuguese and a beginner in French. When he started debate, he said, “I spoke very good English, but I’m always learning English because it’s my second language. It was very helpful that way and it extended to other languages because skills transfer.” Speech has taught him that “the way that your voice carries itself…enunciation, pronunciation, your cadence…being able to know how to match the way I’m speaking to the words that I’m saying” matters. It matters when competing in tournaments, and when navigating life.
"I spoke very good English, but I'm always learning Englihs because it's my second language. It [debate] was always very helpful that way and it extended to other languages because skills transfer."
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