On Wednesday 20th March, Mrs Sinclair took the Year 9 debating teams to Galstaun College in Ingleburn, to begin our Warringah Independent School’s Debating Competition for 2019. The competition is comprised of a series of impromptu debating tournaments between The German International School Sydney, Galstaun College, NorthernBeaches Christian School and Christian Covenant School. Our two GISS teams drew a mystery topic and they had 1 hour to prepare their case.

The first debate was GISS Team 1 (Sofia Aroyan, Micah An, Sandi Salonen and Gemma Gill) versus Galstaun College. They had to argue the affirmative case for, “That the koala is more important than the microchip”. Our students valiantly defended the koala and the loss of the natural environment that they represent.

Micah: It was lots of fun and I am definitely going to do it again.

Jemma: I had a positive experience at debating and it was good for practicing public speaking.

In the second round of debates GISS Team 2 (Jai Thakur, Kevin Zhao and Maddeline Smith) versed Northern Beaches Christian School and argued the negative case for, “That males are the forgotten gender”. Although the team made excellent arguments about how men have dominated history and continue to have many advantages; 

Kevin: It [debating for GISS] was something different and it was good to see the other schools and interact.

Jai: This tournament was very challenging in contrast to previous years. I encourage other students to join debating.

After the debates, we had a very special lunch of chicken noodles in the beautiful playground of Galstaun College with its views of Kurringai National Park.

Mrs Sinclair would like to thank the teams for their exemplary behaviour and enthusiasm. The next interschool debating competition will be for Years
7&8 Wednesday 8th May, at Christian Covenant School.