Goodbye to our Senior A debaters and Finals update

It’s a bittersweet time of year for Debating as we embark upon another finals campaign for the ISDA and FED competitions and have to say goodbye to our Senior Year 12 debating teams.

Last Friday was the final debate for a group of Year 12 debaters who have been representing the School for the last 5-6 years. Our ISDA Senior A team (Annaliese Yan, Uma Singleton, Nitya Nimalan and Sophia Bucci) made it through to the Octo final, but the luck of the pool draw meant we were up against the team from Sydney Grammar. This team is notoriously good every year, so our team was feeling understandably pessimistic about their chances. Bracing pep talks from their coach Old Girl, Jade Di Girolamo (2022) and Andrea Rowe, Oratory Coordinator, meant the team were ready to debate as hard as possible. It was a close result watched on by a group of dedicated parent spectators, but in the end, we lost.

All the members of the ISDA Senior A team have been amazing representatives for our School across so many Debating competitions, Festival of Speech events, Archdale representative debating teams, public speaking competitions and special debating one day events. Every year when called upon to do yet another activity they always answered with an enthusiastic yes. The result has been many amazing wins, trophies and a few memorable losses and tears over the last six years. I am so grateful to them all for their can-do attitude and willingness to embrace every new challenge presented to them. I know our co-curricular program has given them skills and experiences that will be valuable in their future lives.

One of the great bonuses of running the Debating and Oratory Co-curricular program is meeting so many parents after hours. A special thank you to the parents of the Senior A team who have supported the program for so many years, we will miss you too.

Last Friday our ISDA Primary B, Year 8 and Senior B teams won through to the Quarter Finals and our Primary A and Year 9 teams will be competing this Friday in Octo 2. For the FED competition our 7A, 8A, Year 9, Year 10 and Senior A teams have won through to the Semi Finals and will be competing for a place in the Grand Final this Friday evening.

– Andrea Rowe
Oratory Co-Ordinator

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