Members of the UNLV Forensics Program will hold a free public debate on affirmative action at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday at the Alumni Amphitheater located adjacent to the Flora Dungan Humanities Building.

The debate will feature four award-winning competitors from the 1996-97 forensics team. Michael Laxague, Joe Cox, Carl Tolbert, and Tonna Purtle will present arguments both for and against the resolution that affirmative action should be abolished.

Laxague took first place in the junior varsity team debate in the Epicenter Invitational at California State University, Northridge, in November. Purtle took the second-place speaker award in the junior varsity debate competition at the Epicenter Invitational, fourth place in the junior varsity debate at the University of Utah, and third place in the Kidney Invitational at the University of Kansas.

Tolbert's list of awards include third place in the dramatic interpretation division of the Greater Salt Lake Invitational at the University of Utah, third place in the Red Rock Classic at Southern Utah University, and third place in impromptu speaking at the Alan Nichols Invitational at the University of Southern California. Cox took the fifth-place award for prose interpretation in the Red Rock Classic and sixth place in the Epicenter Invitational.

The forensics program is sponsored by the Hank Greenspun School of Communication, a department of the Greenspun College of Urban Affairs.

For more information contact Joel Lauer at (702) 895-1749.