Blast from the Past: Pic of our first NITC camp in 2009. Join us for the next one in Colorado!

The NITC coaches just sent out the welcome letter to all our NITC campers. We have a powerful two days set up for them (register here). If you are attending the National Invitational Tournament of Champions as a Team-Policy or Lincoln-Douglas debater, consider joining us. Here are three good reasons…

1. Maximize Your NITOC Experience

There is a magical component to this camp, different than camps at the beginning of the year. All the students have debated the topic and have qualified to NITOC, so there is no learning curve to slow them down. NITC campers jump in 100%. Having students from all over the country is incredibly helpful, too, as they share each other’s flows and discuss the ins and outs of the resolution from their state. We have students from CA, IL, TN, IN, TX, CO and UT ready to roll. This kind of connection with other students and their coaches is directly linked to their success.

2. Materialize Your Prep with Final Installments

One of the most valuable aspects of camp is the product that the students create from now until then: Blue Book / Red Book Final Installment, and for the first time we’ve included it in the cost for camp. This is a final sourcebook edition that is exclusively for the NITC competitors. After the students figure out who’s at NITOC and what flows they have, they get to work developing briefs. We’re totally convinced that competitors from NITC head into nationals the best prepared students possible. I can tell you stories of how debaters chalked up winning ballots solely because they had a brief or response from Final Installment.

3. Manitou Springs Is Awesome

Summit Ministries has graciously provided their beautiful facility in Manitou Springs, a short 20 minute drive from Focus on the Family, the venue for the National Invitational Tournament of Champions. If you’re able to come a couple days early to Colorado, you’ll enjoy the gorgeous mountain views as we work together to “train for action” for the best NITOC experience you can imagine.

We have one last push to get registrations in before we close and huddle our students together. Please consider this opportunity carefully. You want to make the best of your opportunity at NITOC, and we are thoroughly convinced that NITC is key to making that happen:

Register for NITC

Closes 5/25 or when filled.

Need a reason to come to camp? Here are five.

Already convinced? Register here.

Honestly, we here at Training Minds pity the students and coaches who don’t go to camp. Let’s cut to the chase and list the reasons why you should go to Training Minds Camp in Colorado this summer…

1. The Best Coaching. We select our coaches carefully. Many of them are former champions themselves, and most of them are authors of the bestselling curriculum for speech and debate. Training Minds takes this seriously.
2. The Best Resources. We work closely with Monument Publishing, leading publisher in speech and debate circles. Some of the sourcebooks that students rely on all year are hot-off-the-press at camp…and taught by the authors.
3. The Best Venue. It’s tough to beat Colorado in June. The campus of Colorado Christian University is welcoming, and the apartment housing and on-campus meals will make your stay a most pleasant one.
4. The Best Friends. The unique aspect of Training Minds Camp is that it draws in students from all over the country from various leagues. About 4/5 of those who attend are from outside Colorado. What a networking opportunity!
5. The Best Price. CCU has been good to us, securing a good price for the facility and funds to underwrite our camp. We’ve passed this savings onto you by cutting your tuition in half! Seriously, the same camp cost over $1k last year.

And when is the best time to register? Today. Early-bird registration ends May 31, after which the price goes up $100. With these advantages at this price, we may just fill up. So…

Register Today!

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Hello, competitor! Coach Jeub here, president of Training Minds Ministry. You may have heard that I’m heading up the National Invitational Tournament of Champions (NITOC). Registration is open for another week, and I believe every speaker and debater that has qualified should make every effort to go. Let me explain why, and then I want to offer you a free gift opportunity – even if you aren’t planning to attend.

1. NITOC is an “open” speech & debate national tournament

Technically, the only tournament Stoa runs is NITOC, but it isn’t closed to just Stoa tournaments. Any tournament that has a minimum number of requirements can qualify students to NITOC. This is quite different from most other leagues (NCFCA, CCofSE, and NFL only qualifies students from their own tournaments). So, you may be qualified and not even know it!

What this means is that there will be a wide range of competitors from all over the country at NITOC. We’re on track to have over 500 competitors register for over a thousand event slots. That’s incredible! Which leads me to my next reason you should come…

2. NITOC is the ultimate speech training arena

You know what training minds is about: training minds for action. ”Gird up thy loins” 1 Peter 1:13 says, as a warrior suiting up military training. I’m not sure about you, but I believe speech and debate is the best training for young people to take on life, to meet the challenges God has for them. This kind of training jazzes me up!

And the ultimate competition is NITOC. Think of it as the Olympics of speech and debate. Students from across the country will gather in Colorado Springs for a week of games. The coliseum will be lit up with excitement, and you’ll want to be there.

3. NITOC is going to be awesome

And do you know where this will be? Focus on the Family. A more beautiful campus — at the foot of Pikes Peak — is extremely difficult to find. The values Focus on the Family bestows walks hand-in-hand with Training Minds Ministry. We both believe in you – young people – and the good works you have in front of you. Training Minds, Focus on the Family and Stoa want you to join us at NITOC.

In fact, check out the tournament’s website, especially the media page. We’re inviting some famous community and ministry leaders to help out. You will rubbing shoulders with some fantastic people.

And with you there, it’ll be a TOTALLY awesome event. Register today.

=====================

Now, how to get your FREE Gift!

I’m going to give away 1 tournament gift package for every 10 people. Training Minds Flowsheets ($14.95 value), a copy of Jeub’s Guide to Homeschool Speech & Debate ($19.95 value), Training Minds Sticky Notes, and a Pen…over $35 worth of stuff. Tell your friends about this opportunity! Your chances go UP the more people talk about NITOC. Even if you can’t go to NITOC, do thee simple things…

• Browse the tournament registration page: https://nitoc2012.homeschooldebate.net
• “Like” Stoa’s Facebook Page: http://facebook.com/stoausa
  (and like ours, while you’re at it: http://facebook.com/trainingminds)
• Tweet something about NITOC: use the #nitoc12 hashtag

That’s all! When you do, come back to this page and enter to win. I will announce the winners on FB and Twitter. And hopefully, I’ll see you at NITOC!

If you're taking NITOC seriously, you'll want to go to NITC.

Registration for NITOC (the National Invitational Tournament of Champions) opens at noon on Monday, and I very much hope you are planning to attend. An awesome week of festivities is open to all homeschool speakers and debaters from all Christian leagues (see the NITOC registration page for details).

If you are a debater, I invite you to consider NITC (Nationals Intensive Training Camp). Note the slight variation in acronym. It is a 2-day intensive camp on the Saturday and Sunday before NITOC. I want you to attend NITC because of three fantastic opportunities, ones that you won’t want to miss.

1. NITC provides for you the best opportunities for success

I’ll make no bones about it: NITC alumni end up in the final rounds of the national tournament. We’re committed to making sure you’re taken care of, so it should make sense that we have a success record of which to be proud. (Check out our article summarizing our 2011 NITC success.)

But here’s how it effects you: Don’t you want to make your nationals experience the best it can be? Some real sharp debaters commit to NITC, but so do debaters who barely made it to nationals.

Bottom line is that you should desire to be the best you can be at nationals. The training we’ll put you through is second-to-none, and I believe you want that.

2. NITC connects you with teams outside your state or region

Chances are you’ve debated extensively with your good friends. Perhaps you have traveled to a tournament or two outside the regular mix of students. But overall, you’ll be meeting all new teams at nationals, and who knows how well you’ll do.

All the more reason to come to NITC. As of this morning, we have debaters registered from Colorado, California, Indiana, Texas, Utah, Tennessee, and Illinois. That’s quite a diverse group of students!

And they’ll be bringing their flows and comparing notes with fellow campers. Honestly, this is a hotbed of intelligence all geared to making your competition absolutely awesome.

3. NITC campers will be coached by the best

We have an absolutely awesome coaching staff. Several of them are national contenders themselves, and we’re even Skyping in one of our coaches from France. Is that cool or what?

The point being is that we’re pulling out all our guns for NITC. This is the end of the year, and you definitely deserve it.

Make the best of your nationals experience. Register today:

Nationals Intensive Training Camp

June 2-3 • Summit Ministries • Manitou Springs
Cost: $149 per debater

Releases May 15

RELEASED TEN DAYS EARLY!!!

BUT THE SAME INCREDIBLE DEAL AVAILABLE THROUGH MAY 15

I cannot say enough about Vance Trefethen. He has diligently put his time and effort into training homeschool debaters in the skills of team-policy debate since 2001. His brand new textbook releases in a few weeks, and I have a special deal for you. But first, let me explain a little bit about Vance.

Vance and I have been writing one of the bestselling sourcebooks on the market, Blue Book. Currently, we have 11 years of sourcebook material published. We’ll likely keep writing it together till one of us dies (hopefully many years from now!). Every year when the leagues release their resolutions, the two of us begin strategizing how to develop the best resource possible for team-policy debaters. We always “top” the year before.

Vance and I have also been leading Training Minds Ministry, the organization of which I am privileged to serve as president. We’ve been doing camps since 2001 when he started them in his garage! In fact, many of his sessions are transcribed in this book. They are fantastic strategies that have brought countless debaters to the final rounds at tournaments.

I’m super glad to publish this book. You will find the keys to champion debating in these pages, keys that aren’t found elsewhere in the competitive speech and debate world. And I have higher hopes that you will attend our camp and be coached by the “great one,” Coach Vance Trefethen. The techniques in this book are one thing, but to have him lean over your shoulder as you’re assembling your speeches, to have him critique your arguments unlike anyone you’ll ever encounter in competition, to have him flow your round on a whiteboard as he coaches you through the scrimmage – I’m telling you, there is no better way to learn the ropes.

To celebrate Vance’s new textbook release, I’m offering you a special package that rolls all three things into a $20 package. When you preorder in the next three weeks, you will receive:

1. Keys to Team-Policy Debate by Vance Trefethen ($24.95 value — releases May 15)
2. Jeub’s Guide to Homeschool Speech & Debate (my book, valued at $19.95)
3. Camp Debates DVD: Case Construction (a camp DVD that will prove incredibly valuable to you, also $19.95 value)

This is a $65 value for only $20! With these three resources — Vance’s text, my how-to manual, and accompanying camp DVD — you’ll be off to a great start to mastering team-policy debate.

Order today at Monument Publishing

Expires May 15

In case you are interested, check out our camps this summer. They’re half the cost of last year and deliver twice the value! Space is limited.

Matthew Mittelberg, one of our alumni, had his family record him at NITOC last year. It’s quite a speech. He won First Place in Persuasive and took home a beautiful trophy. He submitted his speech for the Focus Film Project, and we want more speeches like his. Perhaps this includes you!

The good people at Focus on the Family are so interested in our community of speakers and debaters that they have blossomed a most exciting project, one that you’ll want to be involved in.

The Focus Film Project will film top competitors and their award-winning platform speeches. Focus on the Family movie group are award-winners themselves, and they will cut and edit these speeches for mass production. They plan to launch these short films on YouTube and other media channels to bring your message to the world.

Do you have any idea how incredible this is? Focus on the Family has developed media outlets much, much bigger than our tiny speech leagues. And this will be YOUR message, copyrighted and written by YOU! This is “training minds FOR ACTION”…and you can’t get much more active than this.

And one note on this project. Notice Matthew is all suited up ready for competition. Focus wants to film you as a student or young adult in regular clothes, shot with scenery outside of the competitive environment. Focus wants to have your words impact a broader audience. Again, I hope you find this as exciting as me.

This is the last week Focus is taking applications for this project. I know some of your speeches – I’ve perhaps judged them at tournaments before – and with a little bit of effort and bravery, your message could be broadcast to thousands – perhaps more! This is open to all speakers no matter the league, no matter the year you ran the speech, or even involvement of our camps. Sign up your speech today for this special Focus on the Family Film Project.

Sign Up Here

Chris Jeub, President

"Train the mind for action." 1 Peter 1:13

Sorry, this projected closed May 11

You’ve “trained your mind,” and now it’s time “for action.” Together with Focus on the Family, Training Minds Ministry is seeking platform speakers to bring their message to the world. Here’s how this will work.

Fill out the form below. Once finished, you will be given an email address to send your scripts, the same scripts you prepare for competition. Focus on the Family will review the scripts and – upon acceptance – schedule a time and arrange a setting to film your speech. This will NOT be a tournament setting and will NOT interfere with your competition. Focus wants to capture you as a young person in everyday clothes, speaking into the camera eye. The editing crew at Focus on the Family will turn your speech into a video to be used by Focus for their various ministries.

Focus is particularly interested in the following speech topics:

• Pro-life. The sanctity and dignity of human life at every stage includes those such as the preborn child, orphans, those with special needs, the elderly and victims of human trafficking, racism and genocide.  I am Pro-life page on Facebook has 192,000 likes.
• Adoption and Orphan Care. As Christians, we are not all called to adopt, but Scripture does call us to care for the orphan. www.iCareAboutOrphans.org
• Truth Project. Focus’ Truth Project covers biblical worldview issues of our day. Its Facebook page has over 65,000 likes.
• Public Policy. A debater’s dream job, CitizenLink promotes Biblical citizenship and encourages people of faith to engage the culture, speaking truth with grace for the good of our community.

As you may know, Focus on the Family is the home for the National Invitational Tournament of Champions. If you are coming to NITOC, Focus wants to capture it around the competitive week. However, know that this opportunity is open to all speakers from all leagues (Stoa, NCFCA, CCofSE, NFL). The script and presentation is what Focus on the Family wants to capture on camera.

This is a wonderful opportunity! Your platform speech could reach far beyond the platform of competition. Focus will work with their media crew and select appropriate scripts. Once selected, they will contact you and work out arrangements.

Vance and I are on the far left, pictured with three of the younger TMM coaches. This was a beach party following our NITC program at nationals a few years ago.

The following is the foreword written for Vance Trefethen’s new book, Keys to Team-Policy Debate, Monument Publishing’s 4th textbook in its line of “Keys” products. A preorder package is now available.

I cannot say enough about Vance Trefethen, and I don’t think I can put my support behind another book as strongly as I can Keys to Team-Policy Debate.

Vance and I have been writing one of the bestselling sourcebooks on the market, referred to often in this text as Blue Book. At the time of this text’s printing, we will have had 11 years of sourcebook material published. We’ll likely keep writing it together till one of us dies (hopefully many years from now!). Every year when the leagues release their resolutions, the two of us begin strategizing how to develop the best resource possible for team-policy debaters. I stick with basic topical research and Vance plows through writing the foundational cases and negative briefs. We always pump out an awesome sourcebook, and we always “top” the year before.

Also referenced in this book is Training Minds Ministry, the organization of which I am privileged to serve as president. In fact, at the bottom of every page is its website address, www.trainingminds.org. Training Minds offers camps to students who want to take this team-policy debate seriously (as well as other speech and debate events). Vance heads up the team-policy program, and many of his core sessions are transcribed in this book.

I’m super glad you have this book. You will find the keys to champion debating in these pages, keys that aren’t found elsewhere in the competitive speech and debate world. But I have higher hopes that you will attend our camp and be coached by the “great one,” Coach Vance Trefethen. The techniques in this book are one thing, but to have him lean over your shoulder as you’re assembling your speeches, to have him critique your arguments unlike anyone you’ll ever encounter in competition, to have him flow your round on a whiteboard as he coaches you through the scrimmage – I’m telling you, there is no better way to learn the ropes. Camp truly sharpens your mind and makes you the champion you (and Vance and I) know you can become.

Allow me to share with you a bit of the vision Vance and I have had since Day 1. Training Minds is a ministry. We launch from 1 Peter 1:13, “train the mind for action,” a biblical mandate that calls Christians to the higher calling of thinking, speaking and persuading. Vance and I (and a host of other champion coaches) want nothing more than to see you take the top award at Nationals, but that’s not all. We want you to excel beyond competition and take off into the life God has in store for you. With the training you receive in this book, the activity of team-policy debate, and the coaching you receive at camp, there is no telling what exciting life you’ll be equipped to plow through.

An interesting reality is taking shape for Vance and me. We’re noticing some of our former students do some daring, fantastic, awesome things in their young lives. We find ourselves chatting, “Hey, remember so-and-so? Well, they’re doing such-and-such for Dr. Bigshot in Washington.” Our stories are gathering, and so they should! These aren’t puffy pageant skills we’re teaching you here. We’re teaching you how to think, speak and persuade! These fundamentals will empower you to take on the great journey of life that awaits you after your competitive years.

Honestly, I cannot think of a better life-training activity than team-policy debate. Vance goes into this right off the bat in Chapter 1, and the rest of the book fleshes out the details. The activity of team-policy debate is the best training for young people to train for action. I’m sure of it. Vance and I will – in the not too distant future – be able to say, “Yep, judged him just a few years back,” or “She was a fantastic debater back in the day, and look at her now!”

And I bet that you will be one of those students. Do you see yourself as such a person? Get used to that picture in your mind, the idea that you’re going to be someone great. Imagine Vance and I, someday, kicking back in the judges lounge at some tournament back in your hometown talking with others about how you used to shake it up in debate. You’ll be inspiration for the next generation, that’s for sure.

As you read this book, know you’re being coached by the best. Highlight it, apply its drills, do its exercises – I’m telling you, devour this book. Consider yourself in training. Someday your peers will reference your name and say, “Yep, we debated back in the day.” They will be proud to have known you, even prouder that they played the game of debate with you.

Chris Jeub
President, Training Minds Ministry

Click image to order

If you are participating in Stoa, you know the routine to get to NITOC. You have till the end of this month – just two weeks away – to secure two qualifying check marks on SpeechRanks.com. These check marks will secure an invitation to the national tournament at Focus on the Family in Colorado Springs, June 4-9.

So, why not throw a tournament together? Call it a “Checkmark Chaser” (this is what a northern California club did – see here). Tournaments don’t need to be elaborate or a four-day exhausting event. Here in Monument, we’re putting together a 1-day Lincoln-Douglas tournament on April 28.* It doesn’t have to be complicated, and if it gets a few more students their invitations to NITOC, mission accomplished!

Here are five things that need to come together to put together your “checkmark chaser”…

1. Facility. We found a church with only 10 rooms, but enough to make our 1-day LD tournament work. We’re locked into a facility fee, but you may be able to find a facility that will open their rooms for free, or a small janitorial fee.
2. Date. This goes with facility, of course. We have only two weeks left of this month, but feel free to use a weekday.
3. Events. Don’t feel the need to provide ALL the events. A tournament that offers all 11 IE and both debate formats requires at least three days. You don’t need to exhaust yourself. Like us in Monument, we’re only running an LD tournament. It’s easy and can be wrapped up in one day.
4. Be Legit. Be sure you meet the guidelines for a “qualifier.” Standards are provided on the StoaUSA website. It isn’t too complicated and it is easier to set up than qualification standards in other leagues. That said, you still want to be legit.
5. Staff. Pull together your staff. Tournament Director, Tab Director, Judge Coordinator, JO staff, Ballot Admin, Facility Coordinator, and Hospitality. That’s the bare bones to get your tournament rolling. Open up registration on Flow Pad. You’re ready to go!

Basically, this is it. The more complicated your tournament, the more work is involved. But I encourage you to keep it simple with this goal in mind: provide opportunities to some speakers and debaters for checkmarks to NITOC.

I’m the Superintendent for NITOC (see our director staff here). I’m working hard with the fine people here in Colorado to make sure this event is the best national tournament ever. And I want as many people from across the country to join us in Colorado Springs. So, get those qualifying check marks, and we’ll see you in June at NITOC!

By the way, we’ll post about our LD tournament on our Facebook page tomorrow.