Our Coaches
Adam Thane
(Head Coach & Debate Coach)
Adam is the Head Coach for the Bozeman High School (BHS) Speech and Debate Team, Chair of the National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) District Committee for Montana East, a Bozeman High School English Teacher, and The Pan-African Speech and Debate League North America Coordinator.
Adam coaches all four Montana High School Association (MHSA) sanctioned debate events—Policy, Lincoln Douglas, Public Forum, and Legislative; as well as the NSDA debate events—World Schools and Congressional.
Adam starting coaching debate at Bozeman High School in 2004. He began teaching at BHS in 2007 and currently teaches several different English courses. Adam has coached multiple State Champions in every MHSA debate event and has coached 8 policy teams, 7 LD debaters, 4 Public Forum teams, and 4 World Schools Debate teams to elimination rounds at Nationals. He has coached the Hawkers to 6 team State Championships as well as to 12th (2021) and 11th (2022) place finishes at the National Speech and Debate Association High School National Tournament.
Adam was born and raised in Bozeman. He competed in Policy Debate for his four-year debate career at Bozeman High School. He also did Humorous Oral Interpretation his senior year at ABC tournaments. His junior year, he won both prose/poetry and policy debate at the Carroll College Tournament. He was a finalist at state his junior year, and was a member of the first ever Bozeman policy debate team to break to elimination at Nationals his senior year.
Adam attended Saint John’s University and Montana State University, graduating from the latter with a degree in English Literature. He was named the Outstanding Graduating Senior by the English Department at MSU in 2007. Adam took a roundabout route to his education and finished school after a ten-year hiatus from academia, during which he ran security for bars both in Ireland and in the United States. Adam's daughter Ciara graduated from Bozeman High School in 2022.
Email: Adam.Thane@bsd7.org
Lila Michael (Lead Interp Coach)
Lila is lead coach for the Interp events. Lila teaches English I and other courses, and has worked with BHS off and on for several years, in 2003-2007 and in 2014-present.
Lila was born in Missoula and grew up in Bozeman. She was a Hawker all four years of high school as an Orator under Joyce Hannula for a season, and as an Interpreter with Mr. Kane. Lila attended Montana State University where she earned a teaching certification and B.A. in Media and Theatre. She holds a Masters of Fine Art in Acting from Indiana University in Bloomington, IN.
Lila is married to playwright Greg Owens, a native Hoosier. She has two daughters, Lorelei and Eiseley; a green-eyed ranch cat named Suki; and a standard poodle named Flufferson.
Email: Lila.Michael@bsd7.org
Max Hatten (Debate Coach)
Emily Daniels (Memorized Coach)
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Jake Hoskins (Debate Coach)
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Chris Warren (Short Prep Coach)
Chris Warren is the coach for Short Prep. They teach 8th-grade ELA and Social Studies at Sacajawea Middle School. They also help with the middle school Speech and Debate program.
Chris worked with the Hawkers during the 2019-2020 season before leaving to teach in Shepherd, MT where they head coached the Speech and Debate program there from 2020-2023. Chris returned to working with the Hawkers in 2023. In their years of coaching, they have coached both state champions and national qualifiers in five different events.
Chris went through Bozeman School District from 3rd grade until graduation. They were a Hawker under Head Coach Adam Thane and competed in Memorized Public Address and Expository Speaking. Chris attended Montana State University, graduating with a degree in English with a focus in Education. There they received the Outstanding Student Teacher Award. Chris went on to get their Master of Education in Literacy from the American College of Education in 2023.