Richard Bracknell Service Award Recipients
Beginning in 2014, the Georgia Forensic Coaches Association honors an individual annually for their service to the organization. In 2017, the GFCA named the award after former long time GFCA President, Richard Bracknell. He was the recipient in 2016. The award will be given every year and voted on by the Executive Committee of the Association.
2023 — Tom Preston, University of North Georgia
Tom Preston is retiring as DOF at the University of North Georgia. As DOF at UNG, he has built a program that supports debate in all facets. He's built a longstanding partnership with the Atlanta Urban Debate League providing UNG debaters to help judge their AUDL debates on the weekend. This past season, he worked with Marist School and provided more than 50 volunteer judges for the Georgia Speech Scrimmages - something that helped keep these scrimmages completely free to Georgia schools. He has offered his judges to individual tournaments around the state for the past decade. He also opened up his campus to the GFCA to use for a Varsity State Tournament.
2022 — Jonathan Waters, Northview
Jonathan is a Speech and Debate Coach for Northview High School. He is an integral part of the GFCA, and has consistently served the GFCA through virtual and in-person events and remains a prominent figure to promote health and diversity through this pandemic. He is always available to offer help and advice to his colleagues and members of the speech and debate community. In 2021, he revitalized the newsletter and maintained communication with the whole organization.
2021 — Maggie Berthiaume, Woodward Academy
Maggie is the Director of Debate at Woodward Academy. She volunteers to make sure the Georgia novice policy packet is something that every policy school can use and implement in their classrooms. She puts in a ton of work to make sure that our novices do not fall behind other states by making our packet stand above the others. During the year of virtual debate, Maggie was also a crucial aspect of ensuring that Georgia could continue to debate virtually by developing a best practices guide and helping in numerous tabrooms across the state.
2020 — Pam Childress, Valdosta
Pamela Childress built a large, highly successful program in a short amount of time and devoted countless hours to this activity at the district and state level, serving on the Southern Peach District Committee as well as the GFCA’s board in multiple positions. She has established a tournament and continues to promote Speech & Debate in south Georgia while traveling crazy numbers of hours on a bus with her team to support tournaments all over the state. She is helpful and kind to newer coaches, and always considers the best interests of our students—all of our kids—when making decisions.
2019 — Shunta Jordan, Pace Academy
Shunta Jordan supports speech & debate in a variety of roles. As a speaker at the NSDA Education Conference, she has enlightened and educated our community about gender and racial inequality in our community. As a leader of the National Debate Coaches Association, she supported bringing Nationals to Atlanta and building resources and opportunities to member schools by the NDCA. As a tournament administrator, she is regularly in tabrooms across the country and served as Chair of the Policy Debate tabroom at NSDA Nationals in 2018. As a coach, she had helped facilitate many opportunities for AUDL competitors by hosting several state championships and summer institutes at Pace Academy.
2018 — Mario Herrera, Grady High School
Mario Herrera is the Director of Speech and Debate at Grady High School. He has served as the Chair of the organization for many years. Mario has a proactive philosophy of running his program: “Some kids need the team. The team needs some kids.” He feels that this activity can be a great equalizer of opportunity. To that end, he demonstrates and teaches encouragement that is challenging, embracing the diversity that makes us who we are as individuals. . He believes that it is his job to help students realize not just that they have a voice, but that their voice matters. That is true success in this activity. He selfishly gives to his program as well as the forensic community. His passion, dedication, and servant's heart make Mario a true model for service that this award symbolizes.
2017 — Jeffrey Miller, Marist School
Jeffrey Miller is Director of Speech & Debate at Marist School and has served in various capacities for the GFCA. In addition to coaching numerous state champions and national qualifiers, Jeffrey has held almost every leadership position in the GFCA. He served as President of the organization from 2010 to 2015 and again in 2017. He served as a co-chair of the committee that rewrote the constitution in 2008. He lead the restructuring of the GFCA in 2016 which lead to a more equal division of responsibility among the committee.
2016 — Richard Bracknell, Carrollton High School
Richard Bracknell is the Director of Finance of the Georgia Forensic Coaches Association and Head Speech/Debate Coach at Carrollton High School. In addition to coaching numerous state champions, national qualifiers to the NSDA and TOC, Richard has led our organization for almost thirty years. Richard served as President of the Association for more than 15 years. During that time, he allowed the GFCA to create progressive policies like the Novice Policy Debate Packet and the creation of the JV/Novice Debate State Championship. He also led the GFCA through its withdrawal of the GHSA - a decision that led to the creation of the Varsity State Championships for ALL EVENTS!
2015 — James Herndon, Emory University
James Herndon is the director of debate programs at Emory University. James served as the coordinator and author of the Novice Policy Debate evidence packet from 2005 to 2012. With his leadership and tireless work, the GFCA's Novice Packet has become a staple tool in debate classes across the state. In 2014, the novice packet was implemented and used across the entire southeast in seven different states.
James Herndon coached at Chattahoochee High School where he produced several GFCA State Champions and several national qualifiers to the Tournament of Champions. James still continues to judge at high school debate tournaments and work at debate institutes in the summer.
2014 — Joseph Mandarino, Stanley, Esrey & Buckley
Joseph Mandarino is a partner at Stanley, Esrey & Buckley and serves as the accountant for the Georgia Forensic Coaches Association. Joseph led the GFCA through our incorporation and tax filings. With his help, the GFCA was granted nonprofit, tax exempt status. By being a 501(c)3, the GFCA is now able to collect donations for outside donors and use donations directly for students.
Joseph Mandarino is also the father of two former GFCA debaters. Elizabeth Mandarino debated for Marist School and Steve Mandarino debated for Academe of the Oaks. Joseph is a proud supporter of the debate community.