Highly qualified, expert instructors

The Debate Intensive’s mentorship program allows every student to receive a chance to work one-on-one with an instructor of their choosing. Our staff are some of the most successful coaches in the nation, and our students can tell. Learn more about our staff below!

The Debate Intensive has a wonderful staff that is unrivaled in terms of knowledge, skill, passion, dedication, and an eagerness to teach.

— David Si, Debate Intensive ’17

Check back regularly for additions to the summer 2024 staff list!

Curriculum Directors

David Dosch

David Dosch is the founder and director of The Debate Intensive. David is also the Director of Debate at Immaculate Heart High School in Los Angeles, California, where he has coached the team for over eight years. David’s students have won several major national tournaments, including: The Greenhill Fall Classic, The Loyola Invitational, The College Prep LD Invitational, The Presentation Voices Invitational, The Alta Silver and Black Invitational. David’s students have earned a cumulative total of over 50 bids to the Tournament of Champions. As a competitor, David qualified twice to the Tournament of Champions and was in late elimination rounds of many national tournaments.

Scott Wheeler

Scott Wheeler has been the Director of Debate at Peninsula High School since 2016, where he was previously head coach of policy and Lincoln-Douglas debate beginning in 2013. In that time, Scott’s students have won, among others, the St. Marks tournament, Lexington, Stanford, CPS, Blake, Emory, Loyola, Greenhill, St. Marks, MBA, Berkeley, NSDA nationals, and the Dukes and Bailey Cup. Peninsula has also won four state championships and qualified dozens of students to the TOC. Scott has a BS in Communication from Northwestern and an MA from Pepperdine. This is his seventh year of involvement with The Debate Intensive.

Directors of Student Life

Nikki Aqui

Nicole Aqui is an activities director for an assisted living facility as well as a paraprofessional educator for middle schoolers in Lawrence, Kansas. She is also an assistant debate coach for Lawrence High School in Kansas. This will be Nikki’s fourth year working at TDI. In prior years, Nikki has worked with us as a residential assistant. She is looking forward to this summer!

Mike Bietz

Mike Bietz has over 25 years of experience and has been the director of debate at the Harvard-Westlake School for the past 17 years. He has achieved significant accolades, including induction into the Tournament of Champions Coaches Hall of Fame and the Coach’s Gold Key Society at Emory University’s Barkley Forum. He has coached 98 entries to the Tournament of Champions and secured 14 National Championships. His students consistently excel at national competitions, with numerous victories and finalists at prestigious events such as the Glenbrooks Invitational, Berkeley Invitational, and Greenhill Round Robin.

Staff

Hana Bisevac

Hana Bisevac debated for Niles North for four years, where she was in elimination rounds of many tournaments including the Tournament of Champions and she now debates for the University of Kentucky. Hana is looking forward to return as an instructor this summer!

Alex Borgas

Alex debated for Peninsula High School for four years. During his career, he was the co-champion of the Arizona State Invitational, reached semifinals of the La Costa Canyon Winter Classic, and made it to the quarter-finals of multiple tournaments, including the Glenbrooks Speech and Debate Tournament and the Meadows School Invitational. He has received invites to the Harvard-Westlake, Harvard, and California Round Robins and has so far accrued 5 career bids, and he’s excited to return to TDI as an instructor this summer!

Jared Burke

Jared Burke is an assistant coach at Damien High School and at California State University, Fullerton, as a
debater at Cal State Fullerton he finished his career in quarters of the NDT and semifinals of CEDA. In
previous years he has coached CSUF to an NDT qualification, an LD debater to late elims of major
tournaments and doubles of the TOC, and Damien’s historic year of 5 teams to the TOC as well as to late
elim appearances of almost every major tournament.

Nora Cai

Nora Cai debates at Dartmouth College, where she has received a First-Round At-Large bid to the National Debate Tournament, placed second at the Dartmouth Round Robin, reached elimination rounds, and received speaker awards. She currently enjoys coaching policy debate at Interlake High School, and she looks forward to teaching at the TDI!

Niranjan Deshpande

Niranjan have debated for Collegiate School in New York City for four years, qualifying to the Tournament of Champions his senior year. Some of his notable accomplishments include: championing the Newark Invitational and the Newark Round Robin; winning elimination rounds at the Princeton, Apple Valley, Loyola, New York City Invitational, Barkley Forum, and Yale tournaments; and being a top 25 speaker at every tournament he attended in his senior year. I’ve primarily read policy style arguments, but also enjoy topicality and theory debates. He went to TDI as a student and look forward to returning as an instructor!

Jordan Di

Jordan Di is a former debater at the University of Kentucky. He has been competitively involved in debate for 11 years. As a debater, he has been the recipient of 3 First-Round-At-Large bids to the National Debate Tournament, a 4-time qualifier to the NDT, and has won multiple tournaments and speaker awards in college. During that time, he also coached high school policy debate where his teams have won Greenhill, the Billy Tate Southern Bell Forum, the Trevian Invitational, the Barkley Forum, California RR, Cal Berkeley, and the National Debate Coaches Association National Championship. Jordan is very excited to work at the TDI this summer!

Danielle Dosch

Danielle Dosch recently graduated from UC Berkeley with a B.A. in philosophy (magna cum laude and high departmental honors). Danielle has been an assistant coach at Immaculate Heart High School for the past five years. In high school, Danielle debated for Immaculate Heart for four years, where she was the captain of her team for two years. Danielle qualified to the Tournament of Champions her sophomore, junior, and senior years, accumulating a total of 16 career bids. Her senior year, she won the Loyola Invitational, where she was also top speaker and top seed, the Greenhill Invitational, the Presentation Invitational, the Alta Invitational, and the College Prep School Invitational. Danielle was a finalist in the Presentation Round Robin and the Damus Invitational, where she was also first speaker. She was also the top seed and an Octafinalist at the Tournament of Champions. Danielle attended TDI as a student and has been an instructor at TDI for the past five years. She is looking forward to this summer!

Patrick Fox

Patrick Fox is the assistant debate coach at Dulles High School, and competed in policy debate for the University of Houston. Prior to his move to Dulles, Pat coached the first ever qualifiers to the TOC from the Houston Urban Debate League, and has coached numerous critical and policy teams to the Tournament of Champions. In LD, Patrick’s debaters have won the Glenbrooks, TFA State, Grapevine, Stanford, Valley, and reached late elimination rounds of the TOC, as well as deep runs and speaker awards at many other highly competitive national tournaments. As a debater, Patrick was in quarterfinals of CEDA Nationals and received numerous speaker awards and elim appearances at major tournaments. Pat has coached a wide variety of styles of debate, but when not cutting cards his academic research focuses on Marxism, Lacan, and cybernetics. This will be his second summer at TDI, and he’s very excited to be returning as part of the instructor staff!

Michael Harris

Michael Harris is currently the Head Debate Coach at Lynbrook High School. Michael has coached debate for the last ten years, qualifying roughly twenty-five students to the Tournament of Champions. As a debater, Michael earned 13 career bids, won the Berkeley Invitational and CPS tournament, and reached Quarterfinals of the Tournament of Champions. Michael is excited to be an instructor at TDI!

Sohail Jouya

Sohail Jouya has been a director and coach of collegiate, high school, and even middle school debate for the past decade. He has coached teams to deep elimination rounds at CEDA and qualified several teams to the NDT as well as the NPDA National Champions and the NFALD National Champion. At the high school level, he has coached several Policy debate teams, Lincoln-Douglas debaters, and Public Forum (and Extemporaneous Speakers) teams to the TOC, NDCA, NSDA, and deep elimination rounds of NCFL. As a high school director, he led one of his programmes to a #1 international ranking in terms of NSDA degree strength where they also won NDCA Novice National Championships in CX and LD. He also led a Kansas City Urban Debate League middle school programme to a #2 ranking in terms of NSDA degree strength with a quarterfinal placing at NSDA Nationals. He is an advocate for the activity and the transformative and liberatory potential that debate can instill in students.

Gordon Krauss

Gordon Krauss is the head coach of Lincoln-Douglas debate at Peninsula High School. As a debater, he competed in Lincoln-Douglas at Claremont High School, where he qualified to the Tournament of Champions his senior year. He reached late elimination rounds of several national tournaments including the Alta Silver and Black Invitational and the Peninsula Invitational. Gordon has been an instructor at TDI for the past two years and is looking forward to this summer!

Devin Lai

Devin Lai participates in policy debate for Peninsula High School with his twin, Kevin, the best partner he could ask for. In his senior year, he and Kevin have won seven tournaments, including Berkeley, the MBA Southern Bell Forum, and Greenhill. He also won the Meadows tournament in Lincoln-Douglas. He has 22 career bids across policy and LD. Devin loved his time at TDI as a freshman and sophomore and is looking forward to returning to the camp.

Kevin Lai

Kevin Lai loves debate. So much so that he may just be addicted to the game. In addition to the policy debate tournaments listed on Devin’s bio, Devin and Kevin have also won the California Round Robin, Lexington, and Jack Howe tournaments this year. In 2022, Kevin was also the first debater to qualify to the TOC in LD after semis at Loyola and winning the UK season opener. He can’t wait to teach at TDI!

Nethmin Liyanage

Nethmin is a policy coach at Damien-St. Lucy’s. She also coaches LD at Loyola, where she has helped grow the size of the program to pre-pandemic levels. Nethmin has coached students to the Tournament of Champions in both events. Her proudest accomplishment as a debate coach is memorizing all of her debaters’ Chipotle orders. Outside of debate, she enjoys getting lost on the Spanish metro and writing code. She is excited to work with students at The Debate Intensive this summer!

Jonathan Meza

Jonathan Meza is an assistant debate coach at Harvard Westlake. Jonathan, with five years of coaching experience, has guided numerous debaters to qualify for the Tournament of Champions. Recognized for his dedication to giving back to his community, he received the 2021 Volunteer of the Year Award from the Los Angeles Metropolitan Debate League. As a debater he competed a part of LAMDL for 3 years in high school as well as debating for Cal State Fullerton where he made it to elimination rounds at the Wake Forest “the Shirley” Tournament. Jonathan is looking forward to joining as an instructor this summer!

Adam Mimou

Adam Mimou is an assistant debate coach for DebateDrills Academy. As a debater, Adam competed for four years at Damien and Ayala High School, qualifying to the Tournament of Champions three times. He competed in Policy and Lincoln Douglas, winning or reaching the finals of the Harvard-Westlake Tournament, The Barkley Forum, Arizona State, College Prep, Loyola, Jack Howe, Meadows, and Damus invitationals. He reached the quarter or semifinals at the National Debate Coaches Association Championships, the Berkeley Invitational, the Mid America Cup, the Harvard-Westlake Round Robin, the Nano Nagle Tournament, the Grapevine Invitational, and the King Round Robin. Adam attended TDI as a student and is very excited to be joining as an instructor this summer!

Arthur Qin

Arthur debated at Peninsula High School for four years, earning 18 career bids to the Tournament of Champions in policy debate. He won the California Berkeley Invitational and Southern Bell Forum, and was finalist at Greenhill, the Greenhill Round Robin, and Trevian Invitational. He also received 5th place speaker at the Tournament of Champions.

Simone Pisarik

Simone Pisarik debated at Immaculate Heart High School for 2 years and is now an assistant coach. She advanced to elimination rounds at several major tournaments including the Jack Howe Invitational, the Longhorn Classic, and the Peninsula Invitational. She was a student at TDI herself and looks forward to returning as an instructor!

Riley Rees

Riley Rees debated for Immaculate Heart High School for four years, and she was the captain of the team her senior year. She qualified for the Tournament of Champions both her junior and senior years. Riley was in late eliminations rounds of several major invitationals, including semifinals of The Longhorn Classic and the Jack Howe Invitational. She also received speaker awards at the Meadows Invitational, the Nano Nagle Classic, the Jack Howe Invitational, and the Damus Invitational. She attended TDI as a student and is super excited to return as an instructor!

Shaina Sanchez

Shaina Sanchez debated at Immaculate Heart High School for four years and was captain her senior year. As a debater, she has made it to elimination/bid rounds of Damus, Harvard Westlake, Peninsula, Loyola, Meadows, Berkeley, Heart of Texas, Greenhill, and NDCA. She has received speaker awards at Loyola and Meadows and has attended the Harvard Westlake RR. She is excited to return to TDI as an instructor this year!

Arnav Simha

Arnav debated at Archbishop Mitty High School, earning a total of 3 bids and reaching elimination rounds of numerous national circuit tournaments, including quarterfinals or above at the UNLV, Nano Nagle, and CPS tournaments. Arnav now continues to debate at the University of Michigan and looks forward to instructing at TDI this summer!

Lizzie Su

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Su debated for Mountain House High School. During her senior year, she broke at the Tournament of Champions and reached late elimination rounds at tournaments such as Loyola, College Prep, Peninsula, and the Harvard Round Robin. Lizzie attended TDI as a student and is excited for her second year as an instructor

Callum Theiding

Callum Theiding is a rising junior at NYU, studying Biology with a focus on urban ecology. He was Policy debater at College Prep in high school and is currently active on the NYU CEDA squad. He has coached Policy, LD, and PF with the Collegiate School and is now working at the Brearley School.

Coralynn Yang

Coralynn Yang debated for Peninsula High School, where she won the California Berkeley Invitational twice, Meadows Invitational, Damus Hollywood Invitational and Southern Bell Forum and was the top speaker at the Tournament of Champions and Barkley Forum. She currently debates for Emory University, reaching elimination rounds and receiving speaker awards at several college tournaments. She’s excited to return as an instructor this summer!

Elmer Yang

Elmer Yang is a current FinTech Business Analyst who graduated from the University of Texas-Austin with a degree in Business Honors. He debated at Mckinney Boyd High School in Texas and has been a debate coach for 6 years coaching both Policy and LD. Elmer’s students have received over 100 bids to the TOC and won the TOC, MSTOC, New York City Invitational, Glenbrooks, Mid America Cup, and Harvard Westlake. This will be his first summer at TDI and he’s very excited.

Faculty