In his junior year of high school, Zion J. Dixon ’26 won the Tournament of Champions, widely considered to be the most prestigious competition in high school debate.

By his junior year at Harvard, he had stopped competing entirely.

Something about the Harvard team, Dixon said, was “a little bit different” than other college debate programs. The team’s day-to-day rigor was lower than at other schools, even as tournaments themselves were intense, and alumni played an outsized role in shaping the program.

“I noticed that after junior year, most people were not still debating on the team,” he said. “It encouraged me to explore other options.”

Still, Dixon said the team continues to draw the country’s strongest high school debaters every year.

“Harvard debate’s always competitive,” he said. “They’re usually getting the top debaters in the country.”

The Harvard Debate Council, the University’s 134-year-old policy debate team, runs a globally recognized summer workshop, sends its coaches abroad to teach in cities from Mumbai to Singapore, and books nearly $2 million a year in revenue. It operates with a staff of 11 — markedly larger than most competitive university debate programs.

But the program’s competitive standing has fallen even as its brand has expanded. It has not finished in the top five at the National Debate Tournament since 2018, and in 2025 no Harvard team cleared the NDT — meaning none advanced to the round of 32 — for the first time since 2002. The team has also run a deficit in most years since 2016, according to public financial documents reviewed by The Crimson.

Arthur Joseph “Tripp” Rebrovick III ’09, who has served as the organization’s director since 2017, disputed the characterization of the team’s competitive trajectory, pointing to a string of tournament runs and first-round bids during his tenure.

“Harvard has not only received 11 first-round at large bids in Dr Rebrovick’s tenure but has also built an unprecedented record in the 78-year history of the tournament by having four distinct teams composed entirely of first-year students receive first round bids,” he wrote.

The slide has unfolded alongside a string of professional and cultural ruptures: two acrimonious coaching departures, a Title IX complaint against the team’s retired director, and a tournament-week clash with Harvard’s parliamentary debaters that ended in a five-figure settlement.

In interviews with more than 60 current and former HDC affiliates and financial documents reviewed by The Crimson, the program emerges as one that, under Rebrovick, has placed increased emphasis on overseas programming while navigating strained relationships within Harvard’s debate community.

‘A Long-Term Problem’

For nearly four decades, the HDC ran on the partnership of Dallas G. Perkins Jr. and Sherry A. Hall.

Perkins retired as director in 2017 after 38 years coaching the team’s policy debaters. Hall stayed on after his retirement, helping run logistics for the team and its summer workshop.

Allan Louden, a previous director of debate at Wake Forest who knew the pair for more than four decades, described Perkins as a “free spirit” committed to debate as “a labor of love.” Hall, he said, was the one who “keeps the wheels on the wagon.”

With limited University funding, the group built a publications business, the summer workshop, and high school debate tournament into the team’s main revenue sources, allowing the program to cover conference travel for competitors, according to alumni. Several alumni credited the competitive infrastructure built by Perkins and Hall for the team’s mid-2010s dominance.

Fred G. Karem Jr. ’95, a former HDC debater who debated in 1994 under Perkins, wrote in a statement that Perkins “expected debaters to live up to their commitments.”

Michael H. Suo ’15, a former team captain, said Perkins viewed debate through a “competitive lens” and could be sharp with students who fell short, though he did not recall any incident that “crossed the line.”

“When you’re a college kid, I could see it being kind of intimidating,” Suo said. “Sometimes if you were late — you know, you’re a college kid, so you didn’t get up on time to go to the airport — Dallas was yelling, he’d be like, ‘What are you doing?’”

Perkins wrote in a statement that he and Hall ran the team during “a more competitive era.”

The program “was made up of winners,” he wrote, “and we’re proud of that fact.”

After Perkins’ retirement, he continued to play a peripheral role on the team.

In 2023, the program faced two separate personnel disputes: a Title IX complaint against Perkins and, months later, discrimination claims raised by Hall after she left the summer workshop early.

Three former student members of the HDC said Perkins sometimes used racialized language when referring to minority debaters. In a statement, Perkins said he may have used the phrase “Negro Debate” before.

One former Black female member also said that in 2019, Perkins told her about the breasts of a Black woman who had cared for him as a child, a comment she said made her uncomfortable.

“The Black woman with large breasts was my pre-school nanny,” Perkins added in the statement.

A Title IX complaint was filed against Perkins after an incident during the group’s January 2023 trip to Washington D.C. for a Georgetown University debate tournament, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Perkins said the complaint “was specious and never resolved.” He added that he was not “asked to step back from anything” as a result of the complaint.

Months later, in a separate dispute, Hall departed the summer workshop a week early after a conflict with Rebrovick over Hall speaking harshly to a summer staff member, according to two staff members familiar with the matter.

She subsequently hired a lawyer and raised claims of age and gender discrimination, citing the significant age difference between herself and her replacement and a perceived double standard between male and female coaches, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The board hired outside counsel specializing in gender discrimination cases. Perkins and Rebrovick were recused from the deliberations of the “Special Committee” that was formed to review the claims. Hall accepted a severance package whose terms included recognition of her years of service.

“The Special Committee concluded that these claims were unfounded, yet also concluded that it was appropriate to provide Hall with a severance package in recognition of her many years of service to Harvard Debate,” the Board of Directors wrote in a statement.

In 2024, the HDC issued a statement announcing Hall’s retirement, thanking her for 36 years of “legendary hospitality” and her commitment to championing gender equality in debate.

Hall did not respond to a request for comment on the case. Rebrovick declined to comment on the incident, saying he would not comment on personnel matters.

‘Money Will Never Be A Problem’

Under Rebrovick, the HDC operates on a different financial register than its peers — and it has used that money to build out a program unlike any other in collegiate debate.

The team’s roughly $2 million in annual revenue — drawn largely from a deep alumni base, the high school tournament it hosts, and the summer workshop — has funded an unusually expansive operation. The HDC employs 11 staff, more than most peer programs with a comparable number of participants.

Brendon Bankey, director of debate at the University of Texas at Austin, said his team employs himself and two graduate student coaches. Zidao Wang, a former assistant coach at Georgetown, said the team usually operates with a director, an assistant director, and three or four assistants.

“There was never a sense of scarcity,” said Kristen Lowe, who served as an assistant coach for the HDC in 2017 and later coached at Northwestern and Dartmouth. “So, being at Harvard, you have this feeling that money will never be a problem.”

According to financial documents reviewed by The Crimson, the team has run a deficit in six of the eight fiscal years between 2017 and 2024, with losses exceeding $170,000 in 2017 and 2019.

Rosenbaum said the shortfall is by design.

“We budget to run a small deficit at Harvard Debate Incorporated because there are funds that the Harvard Debate Council gets from University endowments that make up the difference,” he said.

A College spokesperson confirmed that Harvard maintains endowment and gift accounts that pay for the director’s salary, office expenses, and Harvard-issued bills.

The team’s competitive results have slipped in recent years as well. Harvard has not finished in the top five at the NDT since 2018, and Bankey said the program is no longer in the same tier as Emory and Michigan, which he described as “perennial powerhouses” supported by “lots of different sources of university support.”

But Bankey does not view the trend as an indictment of the team’s overall success.

“It’s natural for some programs to ebb and flow,” he said.

A significant share of the team’s spending now flows abroad. According to publicly available records and several team members, Rebrovick was scheduled to take at least 10 international coaching trips over the past two years, with stops in Mumbai, Singapore, Tanzania, Morocco, the Dominican Republic, and Vancouver.

“I sometimes do not know where Tripp is,” said Melinda C. ‘Michi’ Synn ’29, the HDC’s co-president. “They’ll be like, ‘Oh, there’s no meeting today, Tripp’s in Singapore,’ and I’m like, ‘I didn’t even know that was happening.’”

Rebrovick said the trips serve several purposes, including promoting “debate around the world” and building connections with Harvard alumni clubs that ultimately feed back into the team’s financial aid pool.

He framed the international work as core to the program’s mission.

“In short, our programs are making an impact that is felt around the world,” he wrote in a statement. “Hundreds, if not thousands, of students have been able to access debate because of our efforts.”

On the policy team itself, Rebrovick said he has intentionally worked to build an environment “where students want to be.” Several current debaters described a program that is now student-driven rather than top-down.

“It’s not too much pressure. No one’s required to do anything, which is great,” said Jayden J. Bodet ’28, the HDC captain during the 2025-26 season.

Bodet said Rebrovick “tries to make the environment very light and fun” and “doesn’t want debate to be another source of stress.”

Other students said the looser structure leaves the social dimension as the main draw.

“It’s more of a club for me to meet people and just stay in contact with the friends that I’ve made on the team already,” said Dora W. Chen ’29, the current treasurer of the team. “If someone wants to take the activity very seriously, they definitely can. It’s just not the path I’ve chosen.”

‘Accountability and Compensation’

The clearest public sign of the program’s internal strain came in February, when Harvard’s own parliamentary debate team walked off the tournament Rebrovick oversees.

Each year, the Harvard National Speech and Debate Tournament hires members of the Harvard College Debating Union — Harvard’s parliamentary team, separate from the policy-focused HDC — to judge rounds.

The arrangement is essential to both organizations: the HCDU provided roughly 74 judges across the tournament’s Public Forum and Lincoln-Douglas rounds this year, and the payment funds the HCDU’s competition travel.

“As a team with a zero cost policy, the HCDU covers all costs incurred while members compete, including registration, travel, food, and housing — which makes these fundraising endeavors critical to our team’s functioning,” HCDU President Giselle N. Paulson ’27 wrote in a statement.

The two teams annually sign a Memorandum of Understanding — a formal but non-binding agreement that sets the terms of the HCDU’s work. This year marked the first time the HDC added a World Schools Debate division — the format of the HCDU’s invitational — to its tournament.

One clause of the MOU stated that “HCDU members will not judge or assist with the logistics of the WSD,” according to a copy obtained by The Crimson. According to a person familiar with the agreement, the stipulation was in place because the parliamentary team runs its own World Schools tournament in April and wanted to preserve a distinction between the events.

In an email early Sunday evening during the tournament, Rebrovick asked the HCDU to provide judges for the WSD semi-final the next day, acknowledging the breach of agreement but requesting that the HCDU move past it to foster collaboration.

The HCDU refused.

Within seven minutes, Rebrovick cut the number of HCDU judges scheduled for Monday by more than half. Hours later, at roughly 2:30 a.m., the HDC told the HCDU it could no longer sell merchandise on Monday, breaching another clause of the MOU, which permitted HCDU sales at the tournament.

After deliberating from 6 to 7 a.m., the HCDU’s board decided to pull all of its judges from the tournament on Monday, effectively striking the most prestigious high school debate event in the country.

“Since this is a clear violation of our MOU and significant cut to our profits, it is no longer in the HCDU’s interest to participate in the HST this Monday,” the board wrote in a Monday morning email to HDC staff members.

Rebrovick agreed to compensate the HCDU for judging its members completed prior to Sunday — but initially refused to pay for judging lost on Sunday or Monday or for unsold merchandise.

“There’s no legal dispute here,” he said in an interview. “The MOU is not a contract, it’s not a legally enforceable thing.”

But Paulson saw it differently.

“The signed agreement between our organizations should not require the threat of legal action in order for the HDC to adhere to its terms,” Paulson wrote. “We felt the events that unfolded over the weekend were against the terms of the MOU, so we sought accountability and compensation for the harm done.”

The HCDU brought the dispute to Andy Donahue, Harvard’s assistant dean of student engagement and leadership. About a week and a half after the tournament ended, Donahue, Paulson, Rebrovick, and HCDU finance chair Clare R. Rajapakse ’27 met to negotiate a settlement. The final figure was roughly $40,000.

The invoice covered the lost Monday merchandise sales, PF judging, and LD judging, and fell within the range of past payments, though on its higher end, according to a person familiar with the matter. Rebrovick said the settlement did not break the budget.

“This year’s arrangement ended in pretty much the same financial circumstances as the last several years,” he said.

But Rebrovick remained unhappy with how the HCDU handled the situation.

“The debate council has more or less hired the debating union to provide a number of services at the tournament, over the years — some years it’s gone very well, some years it has not,” he said. “This year, in my experience, the debating union did not fulfill its obligations.”

The settlement resolved the immediate dispute with the HCDU. But the episode came during a period of broader strain around the HDC, including criticism Rebrovick described in an internal message to affiliates after the 2025 National Debate Tournament.

In the message, Rebrovick wrote that outside efforts had sought to “disparage what we are building together at Harvard.”

“We will respond to this situation, as we always do, in a way that protects the integrity and well-being of our outstanding team,” he wrote.

—Staff writer Alma T. Barak can be reached at [email protected] and on Signal at almabk.54. Follow her on X @almabk_.

—Staff writer Theresa F. Bartelme can be reached at [email protected] and on Signal at theresabartelme.15. Follow her on X @theresabartelme.