Debaters set sights on world championships

The UBC Debate Society will compete against teams representing universities
from around the world including Oxford, Cambridge, Yale and Harvard at this
year’s World Debating Championships in Cape Town, South Africa.

As the current western debating champions, the UBC team will represent all of
Western Canada at the six-day event taking place Dec. 28 to Jan. 3 at the
University of Cape Town.

All debaters will participate in nine preliminary debates and three speech
competitions. On New Year’s Eve, the top 32 competitors will advance to the
finals and compete in the elimination rounds.

Members of the UBC Debate Society world team are Christopher Moreno, a master’s
student in Applied Ethics who is Western Canada’s top-ranked active debater and
winner of the 1995 Yale Public Speaking Contest; and third-year law student
Justine Wiltshire, a semi-finalist at Oxford’s Debater of the Year
competition.

Combined, Moreno and Wiltshire have 11 years of debate experience, more than 20
awards at the regional, national and international levels and three appearances
at previous world competitions.

“Competitive debate is an activity which encourages the interdisciplinary
application of knowledge, strong research skills, effective public speaking and
incisive critical thinking,” said Law Prof. Donald McDougall.

“It is hard to overestimate the value of exchanging ideas. Events like this
shape the minds of our future leaders. The team representing our university and
province will be ambassadors to fellow competitors and judges from five
continents.”


The Faculty of Law and the Office of the Vice-president, Academic and Provost,
have made financial pledges toward sending the team to South Africa, but
sponsors are still needed.

For information on how you can help, call (604) 221-2775 or (604) 730-8132.