Grammar takes out state debate title

STUDENTS at Ballarat Grammar have achieved a first for the school.

The year 9 debating team secured the school’s position on the Debaters Association of Victoria’s honour roll earlier this month after winning the Grade D schools championship.

The team consisted of students Angela Sun, Jamie Noble, and Xander Warren, with the latter saying it was “exhilarating” to win.

“It didn’t set in until I was on the bus home. We’d gotten a lot further than all the other traditionally really good schools so it was all pretty unbelievable,” he said.

“I didn’t quite believe we’d won. When they announced it, I had to check my cue cards to see that they actually called us.”

The finals consisted of five rounds with the team previously taking part in five regional rounds from March through to July.

The topic up for debate was ‘We prefer trial by judge alone to trial by jury’ which the team argued in favour of against Braybrook College.

Other issues included gambling sponsorships in sports, the Australian citizenship test and the rise of social media.

Practice and research started a few weeks into term one and took place regularly on Tuesday afternoons.

Ballarat Grammar’s director of curriculum John Lee said the team’s win is already influencing the direction of the school’s debating program.

“The school’s often synonymous with… success in sports. Something of this nature hasn’t really happened before,” he said.

“We’re incredibly proud and it’s nice to see our year 9s will hopefully be figureheads for a much more extensive debating program going forward.

“This is a real benchmark. We’ve had 19 year 7 students that now want to take part in debating because they’ve heard about these guys.”

A debating day for Ballarat Grammar year 7 students is set to take place as a direct result of the year 9 team’s win.

The last local school to win the championship was Ballarat High in 2005.