Meet the 2007-2008 UW Coaching Staff

Matt Stannard, MA, Director of Forensics

Matt Stannard has been coaching debate for thirteen years and has helped teams win five national championships and countless tournament titles.  He was the recipient of the 2007 Coach of the Year at the Val Browning Round Robin at Weber State, and is currently a member of the national committee of the National Debate Tournament, as well as an editorial board member for the National Parliamentary Debate Association's scholarly journal Parliamentary Debate.  A successful policy debater for Weber State, he was ranked in the top ten nationally throughout his senior year.  He has served as the President of the National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence, and on the Executive Committee of the Cross-Examination Debate Association.  A founder of the Debate Cooperative movement, he has directed several low-cost summer institutes at UW for both high school and college students.  As a Lecturer in rhetorical theory, and a political activist, Matt writes and speaks on issues of socioeconomic class and political movements.  He has taught at summer debate workshops at Ewha University in Seoul, South Korea, the Emory National Debate Institute in Atlanta, the World Debate Institute in Burlington, Vermont, and at several other summer workshops. 

 

Blake Carothers

 

As a debater for UW, Blake won the Claremont Round Robin, Casper College, and Colorado College and was in elimination rounds at dozens of tournaments around the country, including Claremont, Willamette, Texas Tech, Air Force, and Utah.  Blake served as squad President and was a favorite in the many public debates presented by the Wyoming Speech and Debate Union.  Blake received a prestigious first round at-large bid to the National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence his senior year.  As a second-year graduate student coach at UW, Blake has coached UW teams to tournament victories and elimination round appearances across the nation, and taught at UW's high school and college summer debate workshops.

Matthew Plush

A successful high school policy debater, Matt student-directed the parliamentary squad at Colorado State University, where he was one of the most successful debaters in NPDA and NPTE history.  Appearing at every round robin and in late elimination rounds of every major parliamentary tournament, Matt capped his career as a first round at-large bid recipient and national runner-up at the 2005 National Parliamentary Tournament of Excellence.  Matt was also an extremely successful coach at Poudre Valley High School and Southern Illinois University before coming to UW to finish his MA in Communication Studies.  He is already familiar with UW debate, having taught for several years at the Wyoming Forensics Institute.

Chris Crowe

Chris was the 2006 CEDA Debater of the Year, and during his career he won the Weber Round Robin after two previous finals appearances there (including as a frosh), and appeared in elimination rounds at Harvard, Northwestern, Gonzaga, Georgia State, Emporia, SMS, Fullerton, Wake Forest and the University of Texas.  Chris has served as an instructor at both the University of Kansas and the University of Wyoming high school debate institutes, and was a two-time Fellow at the Arizona Debate Institute.

 

Jason Nichols

 

Jason debated for extremely successful squads at Eastern Utah and Weber State, and was constantly an elimination round participant, before getting his JD from Loyola Law School.  After deciding he'd rather be a teacher than a lawyer, Jason taught and coached at Utah Valley College, and is here at UW teaching public speaking and assisting with the team while finishing an MA in Communication

 

 

Kristen is a second-year Law student at the UW College of Law.  She represented the University of Wyoming in the American vs Irish debates of 2004, the same year she and her partner became the second team in UW history to win the prestigious Point Loma University tournament, and received a first round at-large bid to the NPTE. 

 

Jeremy Weaver

 

A graduate student in sociology, Jeremy won the Air Force Academy tournament while debating for UW, and specialized in non-traditional, critical approaches to policy debate.  Jeremy served as Vice President of the Wyoming Speech and Debate Union his senior year, and as a graduate student has accompanied the team to successful performances at CEDA Nationals as well as assisting at UW's summer debate institutes.