EST. 2018
Meet our coaches
Neil Forester:
​
Neil spent three years in competitive Speech and Debate competing for Kelly Walsh High School in Casper, Wyoming. His debate focus at the time was in policy debate, though he also regularly competed in Extemporaneous Speaking, Oratory, and Duo Interpretation during his competitive career. His experience in Speech and Debate stoked a fire in him that eventually led him to law school and a career as a Family Law attorney. He had the privilege of working with the Speech and Debate squad at Mira Loma High School from 2007 to 2011 that renewed his interest in the activity and is looking forward to coaching Folsom High School’s team for many years to come. He now serves as the Managing Shareholder of his law firm, Forester Purcell Stowell PC, located in Folsom
​
Mike McKeever:
​
Mike McKeever was active in competitive speech and debate for five years in high school and college. The experience was very fun for him and created a lifetime of friendships and crazy stories. He credits the thinking and communication skills he learned along the journey as the most important contributors to a successful four decade career that included founding a community based organization and two private consulting businesses, the CEO of the Sacramento Area Council of Governments and Chief of Staff to Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg before his retirement this year. He decided to devote his career largely to true cause of environmental sustainability as a result of the research and analysis he did on debate topics in this area. He loves helping students who are motivated to learn the critical thinking and speaking skills required to excel in competitive speech and debate because it brings him joy and hope and makes him feel younger.
​
Blane Smith:
​
Blane Smith got involved in debate and individual speaking in 1971, while a junior at West Bremerton High School. It became a focal point of his young life, (which was otherwise somewhat lacking in focus), through college at Western Washington, and during his student teaching assignment at Lake Sammamish High School in Bellevue. Debate helped develop organized, fact-based analytical skills that contributed to his success in the legal field, to which he has devoted some forty years of his life. He now spends his work hours quarreling over what liability insurance covers, (of course quarreling in a polite and analytical way-especially if there is a judge within earshot). Debate was also his introduction to some of the best friends, and finest people, he has had the pleasure to know. He believes in the need to restore a standard of civil, rational, empirical discourse. The interest and active engagement debate can still elicit from bright, capable young people instills in him hope for the future.
But their energy and enthusiasm leaves him feeling geriatric.
​
