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J.W. Patterson (debate coach)
J.W. Patterson (May 9, 1928December 30, 2023) was an American academic and debate coach at the University of Kentucky. He was the University of Kentucky's Director of Debate for 45 years.

Early life and education
Patterson grew up in Stilwell, Oklahoma.

Patterson attended Northwestern State College in Alva, Oklahoma, where he participated on the school's speech and debate team. His senior year, he was the state collegiate champion in debate, extemporaneous speaking, impromptu speaking, and oratory. He graduated in 1948 with a degree in speech and journalism. In 1957, he began graduate studies at the University of Oklahoma.

Career
Patterson began his career as a speech teacher and debate coach at Muskogee Central High School in 1948. At twenty years old, he was the youngest coach in the entire Southwestern United States. In 1953, his team became the first in Oklahoma's history to win both the state competition and the National Forensic League Tournament. In 1957, Patterson resigned from the Muskogee Central High School faculty in order to enroll at the University of Oklahoma. The school board attempted to rehire Patterson, offering him an increased salary, but Patterson chose to remain at the University of Oklahoma for his PhD studies. In 1959, Patterson moved to Tucson to work at the University of Arizona.

In 1960, Patterson began working for the University of Kentucky as a faculty member teaching Communication. Upon his retirement in 2009, Patterson claimed that he accepted the position because it "didn't require [him] to do debate" and that he had planned on not coaching again. Despite that intention, Patterson quickly became involved with debate and coached the University's intramural debate team as early as 1961. Patterson began serving as the student government adviser in 1964 and began directing the University of Kentucky's debate team in 1971. Under Patterson's leadership, the university's team qualified to the National Debate Tournament dozens of times, including a championship in 1986 and a second-place finish in 2002.

In 1972, Patterson founded the Tournament of Champions, an annual high-school speech and debate competition hosted by the University of Kentucky. The competition was bid-based, only inviting the first-and-second-place debaters from a set of tournaments around the country.

In 1983, Patterson published the book Contemporary Debate with his co-author, David Zarefsky. The book is a lengthy defense of the "hypothesis testing" approach to evaluating a debate round, in which judges expect the negation to present as many rebuttals to the affirmative as possible rather than a single rebuttal.

While working at the University of Kentucky, Patterson advised a number of students, including Mayor of Lexington Jim Newberry, Governor of Kentucky Steve Beshear, and legal scholar Stephen Bright.

Patterson retired in 2009 at the age of 81.

Personal life
Patterson became engaged to Virginia Leigh Burleson, a fellow debater, in 1951. The two married in January of 1952. Patterson died on December 30, 2023 at the age of 95.