Prior to a debate tournament, Coppell High School juniors Anjana Boppana and Katy Yan flip through websites, case studies and research papers on their district-issued devices before going on stage and harnessing the power of their voices through a hearty debate round.
Being in Coppell Speech & Debate enables them to speak as much as they want, with all of the resources they need behind them.
However, outside of the Coppell bubble, this is not the case for all debaters. Other debate students yearning to make their voice heard are dragged down by a lack of resources, funding for competitions and disparities within the debate community.
Boppana and Yan were inspired to start Project Be the Voice after seeing the accumulating costs of debate-related workshops, competitions and field trips.
“Public school debate programs are typically underfunded versus their private school counterparts,” debate coach Dr. Jason Sykes said. “Students in need rarely express their financial concerns and sometimes even leave the program instead of asking for help.”
The duo’s motive for Project Be the Voice started the same, yet branched out into multiple disciplines, fitting towards their personal strengths and interests as well as growing into an established organization.
“It was honestly really crazy because we started building one piece after the other,” Boppana said. “We built our local program and then adults started to see our program as something they could take seriously.”
Boppana and Yan focused on creating scholarships and grants for debaters in the Dallas area to pay for competition. By raising money through fundraisers, bake sales and grants, they created numerous opportunities for Coppell Speech & Debate and are looking to establish debate scholarships internationally.
“We are applying for grants right now and we’ve also been doing fundraisers at places like the Coppell Farmers Market where we set up our own booth and have different stands,” Yan said.
Nonetheless, Project Be the Voice did not just stop there. After first-hand experience of the barriers in the speech and debate community, they started to peek past the injustices beyond Coppell to find out what was happening on a larger scale. In 2023, Boppana and Yan started establishing a chapter in Ghana, where they offer free tutoring and debate coaching.
“A main part of speech and debate is not just giving voices to people that are already privileged, but also those who may not be able to voice their own opinions,” Boppana said. “We especially wanted to amplify the voices of minority groups and people that may necessarily not be just part of the mainstream USA circuit.”
Locally, Project Be the Voice also tackles issues within Coppell Speech & Debate. With Boppana and Yan having three years of practice with the CHS debate program, they have experienced prejudices such as misogyny within their circle.
“Even as a woman debater right now, there’s a lot of bias from male competitors, judges and coaches where they think ‘You’re a woman, do you really know what you’re talking about,” Boppana said. “I feel like a lot of female confidence can be undermined because of the idea that men are just more confident or better at speaking.”
To push against these notions, Boppana and Yan publish columns and testimonials on their blog to share stories about women in debate, along with bringing specific issues to light. They enlist writers, including sophomore Ishani Tamma, to recount personal stories in Coppell debate.
“There’s a lot of disparities in speech and interpersonal communication, especially when it comes to sex and gender,” Tamma said. “I wanted to bring that kind of thing to light, so it made perfect sense for me to take up that opportunity.”
Despite originally planning to stay local, Boppana and Yan look to expand their impact to countries such as India and work towards creating more online resources for everyone to access.
“We were planning to have a few events and scholarship funds in our own community,” Yan said. “We didn’t really expect it to go out as wide as other countries, but we’re really glad that it has.”
Follow Anvita (@anvita_bondada) and @CHSCampusNews on X.
