St Cuthberts win Auckland Regionals for first time
The 2008 Auckland Regionals were held over the weekend of the 15/16 March at St Kentigern College. Twenty teams entered the competition and it proved to be a great weekend for all involved! The first round started bright and early on Saturday morning with teams debating whether voting should be compulsory. Rounds 2 and 3 were just as challenging as teams considered whether animal testing should be banned and whether there should be a Pacific Parliament created.
After a tightly fought break – where ten teams were in contention for 8 spots – the competition proceeded to quarter finals on the Sunday morning. Teams in the quarters battled over whether fast food companies should pay people compensation for damaging their health and four of them – Baradene, Kristin, King’s and St Cuthbert’s emerged as the semi finalists. The four teams then competed over whether gay couples should be allowed to adopt children. At the end of five Rounds two finalists emerged: St Cuthbert’s and King’s College.
The final was a close and very entertaining debate to watch with the topic that ‘This House Believes Parents Should be Allowed to Design Their Children’ – recognizing the Council’s regional partner, the New Zealand Bioethics Council. For the first time ever St Cuthbert’s put their name to the Claire Ryan Trophy for Auckland Schools Debating and won in a 2-1 split decision over King’s College with Jeremy Johnson, NZSDC President, chairing the panel.
Over the course of the weekend an Auckland squad to compete at Nationals in May was selected. The following students were selected to be part of the squad:
- Emily Adlam (Diocesan School for Girls)
- Sam Horner (Wentworth College)
- Alex Kirch (Auckland Grammar)
- Ben Kornfeld (King’s College)
- Gretta Schumacher (Baradene)
- Nupur Upadhyay (St Cuthbert’s College)
The best speaker of the tournament was Ben Kornfeld from King’s College.
A number of other awards were given out to students. Three reserves for the Auckland squad were selected: Marianne Villaneuva (Westlake Girls High School), Rory Nolan (St Kentigern College) and Ella Tunnicliffe-Glass (St Cuthbert’s College). There were also a number of Highly Commended speakers who put in great performances over the weekend: Chloe-Rose Barakat-Devine (Baradene), Peter Kim (Westlake Boys’ High School) and Abdal Al-Chanati (Westlake Boys’ High School).
Furthermore, in recognition of their performances over the weekend an Auckland Development Squad was selected comprised of promising Year 12 debaters. The squad will be made up of Scott Ashby (Kristin), Sam Poole (King’s College) and Natasha Frost (Kristin). These debaters will be invited to train with the Auckland squad.
Thanks to Flora Mather and the team at St Kent’s who put on an excellent weekend! Also, thanks to all the adjudicators who gave up their weekend to help out – Jeremy Johnson, Claire Ryan, Jordan Ward, James Little, Anna-Marie Wallis, Glen Holm-Hansen, Glenn Riddell, Amy Vinkenvleugel, Brad Ward, Ben Milsom, Kate Mills, Dan White, George Minton and Paul Paterson.