Coaching staff
Director: David L. Steinberg. Professor Steinberg has been involved in competitive debate since 1971. He began as a high school debater for Huntsville High School in Huntsville, Alabama. He then debated for Auburn University under Director of Forensics, Dr. David A. Thomas. Steinberg received his master's degree in Communication at the University of Tennessee, and began his coaching career at Middle Tennessee State University. In addition to UT and MTSU, Steinberg has coached debate teams at Penn State University, George Mason University, and Towson State University. He has been Director of Debate as a member of the School of Communication faculty at U.M. since 1990.
Steinberg served as President of The Cross Examination Debate during the past year. He is co-author (with Dr. Austin J. Freeley) of the best-selling textbook Argumentation and Debate: Critical Thinking for Reasoned Decision Making, 11th Edition (Wadsworth, 2005), and the author of numerous conference papers and articles.
Professor Steinberg can be reached at Dave@miami.edu, or 305-284-5553 (phone), 305-284-3648 (fax).
Assistant Debate Coach: Johnny Prieur. Johnny started in debate at New Orleans Jesuit High School, continuing on at the University of North Texas. A two-time participant at the Kentucky Thoroughbred Round Robin, he has won speaker awards and been in late elimination rounds at every major national tournament. He finished his career as a finalist at CEDA Nationals and an Octofinalist at the NDT. Johnny has coached high school debate at the Greenhill School in Dallas, Glenbrook South High School in Chicago, and most recently at Celebration High School where he was Director of Debate. Johnny has been at the University of Miami for one year. Johnny can be reached at johnprieur@gmail.com.
Assistant Debate Coach: Nicole Richter. Nicole is a former debater from Minnetonka High School in Minnetonka, Minnesota. She has recently finished a four year debate career at Concordia College where she participated in elimination rounds at several national tournaments including the NDT, Kentucky, CEDA Nationals, USC, and Fullerton, receiving several speaker awards along the way. She went on to win many tournaments, including Baylor, Emporia, Macalester, and Loyola. She also qualified for the NDT first from her district two years in a row. Nicole has coached high school debate for six years at Fargo North High School in North Dakota, for Carrollton of the Sacred Heart High School in Miami, and currently coaches for Spanish River in Boca Raton. Nicole is also the college coach for the debate program at the University of Miami where she has brought competitive success to the team in all three divisions: novice, junior varsity, and varsity. Nicole is committed to increasing participation of females and minorities in debate and focuses a lot of her time and energy on reaching this goal.