After almost 7 months of intense debating we emerged champions of the inaugural Asian Alliance Insurance Debaters' Council Schools League 2009.You can find an audio recording of the debate here
The tournament in itself was fairly a new concept where the top 8 schools (chosen based on the performances at the Sri Lanka Schools' Debating Championships organized by the Moot Court and Debating society of the Faculty of Law early this year) had to battle it out for 7 months to attempt to win the tournament. The schools that qualified for the tournament were S. Thomas' College Mt. Lavinia, Colombo International School, Royal College, St. Joseph's College, Bishop's College, Methodist College, St. Bridget's Convent and of course us! During the league we had to debate each school twice...one debate to be held at our school and the second at the premises of the respective school we were up against. Furthermore one out of the two debates was an impromptu and the second a prepared. We had many enjoyable debates during the league on a wide variety of topics and at the end of the 14 debates we managed to enter the grand finals! (For final points tally see http://thedebaterscouncil.blogspot.com/2009/11/aaic-dc-schools-league-final-points.html).
Im sure that Chris and Sith would agree that although it was a lot of work and effort.....a lot of researching...a lot of time spent debating and organizing debates...it was all worth it!
The finals were against Bishops College Colombo and was held at the BMICH on the 15th of December on the topic "This house believes that the Responsibility to Protect should be the base principle of the modern UN". We managed to beat BC convincingly at the finals and also in great style!
A few people I must thank........firstly the team...Chrisjit, Sithira, Shaz., and Jeremy you guys did an awesome job, if it wasn't for the level of commitment you guys put into this....we wouldn't have gotten this far.Sith and Chris for putting up with me and also for the hard work you guys put....Shaz and Jeremy for always been there for us.... both debating when we needed you and chairing debates....Proud of you guys...and all I can say is....let's do it again and win the next tournament!
And of course a very special thank you to Dilshan Boange, who helped us throughout, helping us develop our presentation skills as well as teaching us to become gentlemen!, MJ for calling us all the way from Australia to help with the case and give us moral support, Aadhil and Niru for helping us with the case and being there for us all through out.
Finaly everyone who helped us along the way including Nishan, Akeel, Khabir, Amirthajeevan, Thanuja, Amaan, Nichula and the gang.Suganthi Teacher and Shanthi teacher for all their help.......everyone else who came to watch the finals and cheers us along.....and a very special thank you to our Principal who constantly gave us his full support and for telling us how important it was to win.
The finals was of high standard...the judges enjoyed it....the crowd enjoyed it...and so did we! well...all I can say now is...Onward to the next challenge!
Maleen
