[GFCA] Policy Topic Vote

[Mario Herrera]

Hello, all.


The National Federation of High Schools has announced the two finalists for
the Policy Debate 2018-19 topic. I have included the original summary sent
by NFHS regarding the two topics. I will send a ballot out to membership on
Monday, December 11. Ballots will be due by 5pm on Friday, December 15.
Ballots are due to the NFHS by January 5th, but I will send Georgia results
before leaving on Winter Break.


Here are the final two topics with their summaries:


*Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially
increase funding and/or eligibility for one of the more of the following:
Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program, Medicaid enrollment, Housing Choice Vouchers Program.*

Poverty in the United States is a seemingly intractable problem.  The
issues surrounding federal anti-poverty programs range from policy details,
to outlines of how they operate, to whether the programs should exist at
all. This topic addresses the federal government’s programs to assist
persons in poverty and asks how (or if) they can or should be improved.
The combination of macro-level approaches, specific policies, and critical
approaches provides for a wide variety of arguments. Students will gain a
better understanding of poverty, specific anti-poverty and federal
policies, and philosophical approaches to addressing poverty.  The topic
also intersects with other prominent policy areas including housing,
healthcare, and hunger.

Affirmative cases can focus on increasing availability of affordable
housing using the Housing Choice Vouchers, increasing access to health care
for low income populations, extending anti-poverty programs to persons
currently excluded by immigration status, assisting domestic violence
survivors, improving welfare-to-work programs, increasing nutrition
programs to decrease hunger, ending time limits for receiving benefits,
increasing funding for anti-poverty programs as economic stimulus and
various other limitations on eligibility for federal programs.  Negative
positions include: states counterplan, counterplans for other means of
addressing poverty such as increasing minimum wage or guaranteed income,
spending disadvantage, federalism disadvantage, welfare dependency,
capitalism critique, biopower/social control critique, antiblackness
critique, counterplan to end welfare, private philanthropy counterplan and
block grant counterplan.

*Resolved: The United States federal government should substantially reduce
its restrictions on legal immigration to the United States.*



According to the *Pew Research Center*, 70% of voters listed immigration as
“very important” to their decision in the 2016 election - more than social
security, education, and environment. With extensive news coverage on
immigration, even novice students have a basic working knowledge of
immigration, making the experience of learning policy debate more
interesting. Advanced debaters can employ nuanced and specific critical and
policy arguments.  Immigration reform offers a rare example of federal
policy where the key questions do not often involve spending money.
Instead, the debate will focus on matters of social justice and fairness.
Defenders of immigration reform argue America is a nation of immigrants,
and a progressive immigration policy will strengthen the economy, as well
as enrich our culture. Affirmative cases might focus on particular
categories of Visas - their criteria and numerical limits; they might focus
on different populations, or areas of the world; they might examine types
of skills under-represented in the United States.   Opponents have voiced
the concern that immigrants take jobs from Americans and might pose a
threat to public safety. Examples of possible affirmative cases are:
Comprehensive immigration reform, amnesty for immigrants already living in
the United States, reversing restrictive state laws, changes to visa/quota
requirements, the DREAM Act, and increasing work permits for immigrants
with special skills in medicine or engineering, among others. Negative
positions could focus on the economic and employment harms of increased
immigration, increased risk of a terrorist attack, disruption of
federalism, and the political implications of immigration reform.

Let me know if you have any questions-

Mario Herrera
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.gradyspeaks.org/pipermail/thegfca-gradyspeaks.org/attachments/20171205/11375c90/attachment.html>