Over three days of competition, Michael Baer ‘08 and Anish Mitra ‘09 talked their way into Stanford debate history with two big wins at the American Parliamentary Debate Association (APDA) National Championships, held from April 18 to 20 at the Mass. Institute of Technology.

The pair navigated six preliminary rounds and one final round to become the first varsity team champions from Stanford. Baer, who has been debating for Stanford since his freshman year, achieved another Stanford first when he was named the tournament’s top speaker. In the final round of competition, Baer and Mitra defeated Princeton, arguing that when faced with the choice, an evolutionary biologist should choose to publicly debate an intelligent design advocate.

“We were definitely an underdog,” said Christine Su ‘08, president of the Stanford Debate Society. “It was pretty amazing that we won Nationals.”

Stanford’s parliamentary debate team competes within APDA, a league consisting of mostly East Coast schools. Consequently, Stanford’s much higher travel expenses means that the team only competes in about half the number of debates that East Coast schools are able to attend.

“We thought that we could be competitive,” Mitra said. “There is a ranking system for teams on the circuit based on points accumulated during the year, [one] which favors the schools that are able to travel to the East Coast debates, and we didn’t travel a lot. Even then, we were fourth in the rankings, so we thought we had a chance. But we didn’t think we were favorites to win or anything.”

Both Baer and Mitra began debating in high school. Baer, a Public Policy major, joined the Stanford Debate Society after signing up at an activities fair and quickly grew to enjoy the parliamentary debate format that he focuses on.

“Parliamentary debate emphasizes extemporaneous speaking and the ability to come up with an argument quickly, on your feet,” Baer said. These skills translate into the classroom. “I write papers better, I’m better in section — everything about school becomes easier with the skills I learned through debate.”

While debate fits logically into many Stanford Debate Society members’ academic and career plans, Mitra is a rare math major on the team. The team captain nonetheless believes debate’s benefits span across all disciplines.

“Debate is nice because whatever your field happens to be, it encourages a lot of critical thinking,” Mitra said. “It makes you think about both sides and justify everything you say.”

After graduating in June, Baer plans to move back to his hometown of Washington, D.C., where he hopes to pursue public policy before going to law school.

Mitra has every intention of continuing with debate.

“I’ve had a fantastic time debating with Michael,” he said. “He’s an excellent partner and his experience helped me a lot, so I hope that next year I will be able to help my partner in the same way.”