Debating Update

Year 10 PDC – Round 1

by Mr Bro Reveleigh

On Monday 27th July, our Year 10 team completed the first round for their division in the Premier’s Debating Challenge. Our opponents were Sydney Secondary College Balmain Campus. The speakers for the Fort Street team for this round were Linus Htaik as first speaker, Nancy Zhang as second speaker, Samuel Hao as third speaker, and team advisor was Kiyasha Chakraborty. After both teams ruled out the first and second topics, the third topic was selected: “That we should study more films in video games in English classes”. SSC Balmain was affirmative and Fort Street was negative.

The main arguments of the debate developed around the value of adding more films and video games in the curriculum and the focus of the curriculum in teaching these kinds of texts. Both teams reflected strong perspectives in their experience of the English curriculum as high school students. Even after the AusAlert drill, both teams were focused and engaging with each other’s cases!

At the end of an intense hour of argumentation, the adjudicator awarded the debate to Sydney Secondary College Balmain Campus. The adjudicator said the clashes were close, and both teams spoke very highly of the other team what they learned from the debate.

The Fort Street team thanked their opponents for a thoughtful debate and wished them all the best in the future. I’d like to wish our team all the best in the next round!

Year 9 PDC – Round 3

by Lachlan Latimer (Year 7)

On Thursday 30th July, the Year 9 debating team had an intense debate against Ashfield Boys High School. The topic for the debate was that publicly elected officials should have to publish a list of their assets on their website.

Admittedly, this was an extremely hard topic to debate but both teams did extremely well with us eventually getting the win. We would like to congratulate the team of four that helped us to the win (Nirvani, Max, Zac and Srishti) and would like to wish them all the best for the future rounds.

Year 10 PDC – Round 3

by Anjana Sanjeevan (Year 7)

On Monday 3rd August, the Year 10 debate team went against Ashfield Boys High School, in a captivating and complex debate.

The topic of this debate was that citizens should get to vote directly on important social changes alongside federal elections.

Our team was negative, and all three speakers spoke with purpose, leading them to win the debate.

Congratulations to Linus, Samuel, Kiyasha and Nancy! We wish both teams all the best for their future debates.