Debating
Interschool debating: Round 3
On Thursday 4th June, our Year 9-12 debating teams took part in Round 3 of the interschool debates. Held at Coburg High School, our teams did an excellent job all around, with two wins from four debates being awarded in NHS’s favour. A huge shout out also needs to go to the two last-minute fill-in debaters taking up the challenge for the first time – Murray Grover (10G) and Indigo O’Brien (8F) – well done!
Our D Grade team (Year 9) were up against Yarrabing Secondary College on the affirmative side of the topic: That we should ban petrol cars from being used for business purposes from 2030. It was a close adjudication, with the opposing team winning by one point, but our very own Uma Nallaratnam (9G) was awarded best speaker with a high score of 77.
Our C Grade team (Year 10s) had their first advised topic. They only knew the topic would begin with That schools should and once the topic was released, they had one hour to prepare their arguments device-free! Secret and advised topics add another layer of complexity to debating and our team did an excellent job for their first time, winning against Santa Maria College by one point on That schools should make it compulsory to learn a non-English language from Year 7-12.
Our A Grade (Year 12s) and B Grade (Year 10 &11s) were both on the affirmative side on the secret topic: That it should be compulsory for consumers to pay a ticket levy for concerts to subsidise local young musicians. Our A Grade team won by a whopping four points (a big margin in debating) against Santa Maria College with Alex Wright (12J) getting the best speaker nod, while our B Grade team were pipped at the post by Princess Hill Secondary College by one point.
Our Junior debaters (Year 7 and 8) are working on developing their critical thinking skills and confidence in debating and are currently preparing for an internal debate series. More are welcome! Just come along to M15 on Tuesday lunchtimes or chat with Ms Balis or Ms Osburn if you have any questions.
