NHI now recruiting ninth graders for GDx and NHI Student Club

As is customary for the National Hispanic Institute at the start of each school year, the organization is reaching out to ninth and tenth graders who are great candidates for its initial summer leadership program. But in 2020, it’s different in a few key ways. For starters, this fall’s recruiting is for the GDx program, created last year as an online transformation of the Great Debate curriculum for the digital age. And for students who join the new NHI Student Club, training starts in January and brings additional benefits along with it. Towards the end of the Spring training, students select debate event categories and prepare to represent their home community or region in an international summer digital debate tournament.

The 2021 GDx programs will build upon what was developed in 2020, with the curriculum benefiting from the input that staff members, volunteers, and students from last year’s inaugural programs gave. The 2021 schedule will begin with spring training followed by one of the four GDx digital debate tournaments.

• Spring Training: January-May 2021
• GDx 1: June 18-20, 2021
• GDx 2: June 21-23, 2021
• GDx 3: June 25-27, 2021
• GDx 4: July 9-11, 2021

There will also be a Global GDx program in September, for students who perform well in their initial GDx programs.

“NHI programs aren’t built to be stagnant,” said NHI Senior Vice President Julio Cotto. “They are designed to provide opportunities for bright, sharp, and ambitious kids who want to make change and positive impacts. NHI is here for them to get the early training and development to be effective in leading.”

“GDx launches into the future from the Great Debate,” he continued. “The first-year experience of the NHI high school academy is focused on advancing young leaders’ communication skills and their ability to persuade and inspire through words. They still do that in GDx, but they now add images, infographics, animation, and so much more. In some cases, they may be asked to say or do it economically, within platforms like Twitter or TikTok that put limits on how long your message can be.”

“GDx continues the tradition of working to refine and advance the public speaking, questioning, reasoning, and debating skills of future leaders,” he added. “But now, it’s with the added twist that their teammates may no longer be sitting next to them. Their competitors may be another scholar in a different state or country. Thus, GDx in so many ways reflects and mimics the future exchange and flow of ideas and debates held on our world’s future.”

The program has a two-tiered tuition fee, dependent on whether applications join the newly-created NHI Student Club.

For students who just want to do the summer program, it’s $700. For students who want to commit earlier and become NHI Student Club members, the program is $575.

The NHI Student Club gives its members, for a $50 annual, renewable membership fee, access to college prep support services, year-round online programming, the organization’s online newsletter, program discounts, and volunteer opportunities for former participants.

The NHI Student Club is open to all students enrolling in NHI programs, including the Lorenzo de Zavala Youth Legislative Session/LDZx and the Collegiate World Series (CWSx). Both the LDZ/LDZx and CWSx students participate in late Spring online training sessions in preparation for their respective programs.

“We’re launching the NHI Student Club program to help NHI students stay involved throughout the year,” noted Chris Nieto, Senior Vice President at NHI. “This summer’s online programming allowed us to see that there was a new kind of online community taking form, and that it would benefit students to be able to participate in it during the school year.”

To see a digital flipbook version of the new brochure for the GDx, click this link, and to get additional info, go to the programs page of the new NHI site.NHI jounry