Our team of passionate debaters.

Internationally student-led.

our board team

Vishnu Dandi

Joseph Jung

founder,
executive director

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Matthew Zhang

advisory,
debate instructor

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Vishnu Dandi

Vishnu Dandi

advisory,
debate instructor

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Vishnu Dandi

Jae Wu Chun

‍advisory

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Addressing disparate debate education access with quality and free debate camps. International Youth Debate Initiative Assc. © 2024.

Joseph Jung

Founder,
Executive Director

Joseph Jung is a graduating senior at Port Moody Secondary, where he is the captain of the PF debate club. Over his three years of debate, he has competed both on the local and national circuit. His notable accomplishments include being the first international team to bid and clear at the TOC, semi-finals at Princeton University Invitational, and 2nd at NSDA internationals, where he also received multiple speaker awards. However, Joseph's most valuable experience in debate has been the privilege to instruct many students who were new to debate, including those with language barriers, and watching them progress over time. While debate is seemingly a perfect activity that teaches students lifelong skills, many students cannot access these opportunities or are pushed out due to resource disparities prevalent in debate. Fortunately, with IYDI, Joseph aims to expand opportunities for younger students to experience a debate curriculum that fosters talent from various skill levels, while creating an environment that welcomes everyone.

Jae Wu Chun

Advisory

Jae Wu Chun is a graduating senior at Pacific Academy, and serves as the Operations and IT Director for IYDI. He has been debating in Public Forum for four years now, breaking in national level tournaments such as in Stanford and Puget Sound University invitationals. Like Joseph, however, the most valuable experiences obtained through debate for Jae Wu has been teaching middle school students that are new to debate. Some of the teams under his training have broke in numerous tournaments, local and national in level, such as in Harvard, Seattle University, NSDA Vancouver, and the TOC hosted virtually. Parallel to his passion in debate is with technology and programming, creating web applications and websites for various conferences, organizations, and businesses. Experiencing how nuanced and critical thinking skills--that debating has developed--has helped Jae Wu in virtually all aspects of life, he is more than excited to help an initiative such as IYDI.

Matthew Zhang

Advisory,
Debate Instructor

Matthew Zhang is a senior at Livingston High School, where he is the captain of the Speech & Debate Team for the 3rd straight year. Over his three-year Public Forum debate career, Matthew competed extensively on the national, state, and local debate circuits. His most outstanding accomplishments include placing top 10 at the Harvard and Columbia University tournaments, 6th at the Yale University tournament, 5th at the Georgetown University tournament, 3rd at the University of Pennsylvania and Princeton University tournaments, 3rd at the National Catholic Forensics League Grand National Tournament, and 1st at the Tournament of Champions. Due to these achievements, Matthew is now ranked the #1 debater in New Jersey and the #3 debater in the United States. Additionally, Matthew has made history as the first debater in the history of his school to win a national championship, and one of the youngest students to ever earn the honor of Premier Distinction from the National Speech and Debate Association. Matthew has coached several novice debaters to win awards at local tournaments. He is excited to help more kids become better public speakers and debaters at IYDI!

Vishnu Dandi

Advisory,
Debate Instructor

Vishnu is a senior at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland. He is currently ranked 1st in the nation by the National Debate Coaches Association and National Speech and Debate Association, qualified to the Tournament of Champions Gold division three times, reaching octos-finals his junior year and earning an auto-qualification to next year’s tournament. He has accumulated fourteen bids to the TOC, won the Yale tournament and Georgetown three-times, semifinaled at Columbia and Stanford.