National competition awaits OU's Forensics and Ethics Bowl Team

By Katie Land, news editor

For the first time in its history, Oakland University’s Forensics and Ethics Bowl Team will compete in the elite Intercollegiate Ethics Bowl National Competition on Thursday, March 4, in Cincinnati.

The team took second overall place at the APPE 2009 Regional Ethics Bowl Competition, qualifying for the national competition. The regional competition was hosted by the Association of Practical and Professional Ethics, a philosophically based collegiate and professional organization.

The team’s achievement comes after years of hard work and practice, according to Lisa Campbell, director of the forensics team since 1997 and Ethics Bowl coach since 2006. Oakland’s team first began competing in 2003.

“For OU, we’re bringing high quality exposure to many groups and people who may never have even heard of our university,” Campbell said. “That group contains members of the Association for Practical and Professional Ethics, which is a national organization. We are also connecting with schools that also have a strong background in ethics and philosophy.”

Ethics Bowl provides a competitive forum for students to discuss moral imperatives and ethical responsibility in areas such as law, military, medicine, politics, education and more. Students make timed presentations in response to a new question each round. There are only 40 teams or less in the country that qualify to compete in the national tournament.

The team’s lofty goal for nationals is to achieve a 3-0 ranking in competition preliminary rounds. “Our students have fantastic strategy, intelligence and diversity. I think a goal of reaching the quarterfinals or more is very achievable,” Campbell said.

Forensics and Ethics Bowl provides the opportunity of learning and working as a team, increases critical thinking, argumentation, and presentation skills, provides a strong extra curricular achievement for graduate and law school applications, and offers credit for a 300 level four credit PHL course for students who enroll.

“It may sound corny, but making it to Nationals is a huge success for us in and of itself,” Campbell continued. “After that, even if we don’t win a match, we will still gain experience from the national competition atmosphere, and that is something that can only help us next year. I consider the experience a success as well.”

Oakland’s team is built each year in the fall semester. For more information or to join, contact Campbell at llcampbe@oakland.edu.