Dave Arnett is the Director of Debate at the University of Kentucky. Before arriving at Kentucky in 2010, Dave was the Director of Debate at UC Berkeley for twelve years. On 23 occasions, his teams have been ranked in the top 16 (US), including 12 top five teams, and 4 overall number one rankings. He has coached two national championship teams as well as two runners-up. Dave was selected the National Coach of the Year on two separate occasions (2009, 2015). His program hosts the prestigious JW Patterson Tournament of Champions which includes a network of over 100 qualifying events serving tens of thousands of students annually. Dave has been involved in international outreach for nearly a decade working extensively throughout Asia and Latin America promoting speech and debate.

Dr. Mikaela Malsin is the Director of Debate at Emory University and an alumna of the Emory Debate Program. She earned her Ph.D. in Communication from the University of Georgia, her M.A. from Wake Forest University, and her B.A. from Emory. Before returning to lead the Barkley Forum, she directed the Georgetown Debate Team and held coaching roles at Wake Forest, Georgia, and Emory. A nationally recognized coach and judge, Mikaela has guided numerous partnerships to First Round At-Large Bids and deep elimination rounds at the National Debate Tournament, including the 2018 NDT finalist team from Georgetown. Beyond her competitive success, she is a leader in shaping national debate education—emphasizing clarity, accessibility, and rigorous argumentation—and has helped expand outreach and training opportunities for students across all levels of debate.

Dr. Marcel Roman is an Assistant Professor of Government at Harvard University, specializing in racial and ethnic politics in the United States with a focus on Latinx political behavior, immigration, and policing. His current book project draws on several representative Latinx surveys to demonstrate how contemporary immigration enforcement undermines political assimilation across multiple dimensions within Latinx communities. A first-generation college student, Marcel attended the University of Kentucky on a full debate scholarship, where he was a four-time qualifier for the National Debate Tournament, ranked among the top 25 debaters nationally each year, and was part of the first all-freshmen team from Kentucky to reach the NDT elimination rounds. He later earned his Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles.