The Debating Matters format is not one I have ever really liked because the speeches are short and there are no points of information, which makes the whole thing far less competitive. Between the regional finals and the national final, I exchanged messages via Facebook with the competition’s press officer, but had to apologise somewhat after a few days of debating: the competition’s questioning from the judges and strong involvement of the floor (audience) has won me over somewhat, and she said that she hoped that might well happen to me. The questioning really is very effective: things come up that teams simply don’t think of on their own, and this really enhances the quality of the debate. Yes, there were arrogant and self-righteous judges who were a bit of a pain, but they were confined to the less important debates and the best judges were polite and reasonably picked holes in cases. However, the judges’ judgements do not deserve the same accolade. A quotation from one sums the situation up: ‘As for [differences between] judges, we’re just making it up as we go along.’ The argument from the organisers which is against tick box style judging makes sense as those who aim to follow a set formal debating formula probably shouldn’t be the ones to be involved in a competition that is interested in digging deep into issues. But the problem here is that this contradicts with the idea of having a competition at all. There must be standards for victory otherwise it simply isn’t a fair playing field. For example, the competition has no marks for style and yet the judges discuss it regularly and we may have lost our debate due to a nervous first speaker.

The Institute of Ideas, which runs the competition (and was formed from the remnants of the British Communist Party so is very fluffy and liberal), also put on a Question Time-style panel one evening and this was excellent. All of the speakers were very good, but there were no real right-wing speakers which meant that everyone agreed on occasions where things might have gone on. The first issue to be discussed was the 42 days row, including David Davis, and my question was called for first: I asked how the panel, if they agreed with the measures, could reconcile the long term seperation of powers with a short term increase in security. After some confused answers I clarified by explaining how I go with the idea that it takes hundreds of years to establish these rights and we shouldn’t sacrifice that as we are only a small group of humans acting in a small space in the expanse of time. The debate moved on Zimbabwe, education (A levels being too easy) and a few other smaller issues. Controversy was caused by a Blairite member of the Institute for Public Policy Research saying that it was a good thing that A levels are getting easier, and the sides of the audience seperated (applauding raucously different speakers) when one proclaimed elitism and another denounced it.

Chairing both this and the final debate was Claire Fox, Radio 4 panellist on the Moral Maze and director of the Institute of Ideas. Opinions on her were mixed among the squad. To me, she was an enthusiastic supporter of open debate with a good personal, arrogant style – and I don’t mean real arrogance but the kind any debater employs in making their point. I could agree with others that at times she was a little self-righteous, but I did not accept the view of some that she was overly so and apparently went on far too long in her speech closing the competition and explaining (quite rightly in my view) how the aim was to draw us upwards into the real political world rather than patronising with simplistic and unimportant motions set for the competition.

Also worth mentioning is that at the end of the panel I had a chat to the Executive Director (or some other title that means the top) of Encyclopedia Britannica who was on the panel. Him and I stayed in the audotorium when everyone else had gone and I attempted to persuade him that Wikipedia really does supercede the commercial product with the argument that you should never cite an encyclopedia in real academic work anyway. He ignored most of it and tried to get me with the usual ‘I like Wikipedia but it is trying to do a different job’. An interesting encounter.

Of course the other aspect to this is meeting all the people involved, and additionally it is amazing how much you learn about people when you stay with them for several days; I refer here to the Silverdale squad. Here is my theory. When people are normally with their friends they are often at their happiest and most open; indeed my sister has remarked that this is true with me. However, over several days people are undoubtedly going to have changing moods and one also recognises annoying parts of people’s behaviour. So it was interesting to see the rest of the squad – who luckily for me I am all friends with; this was not the case for everyone – over the trip. Only two instances of unpleasant behaviour occurred. Going with my relaxed philosophy teacher in charge meant that he was relaxed about what we did, but in all honesty with so much of the squad being eighteen there wasn’t a lot he could do anyway. Additionally I got to know some of the squad better than before as there was lots of walking to be done around London and there were lots of small debates to engage in.

I also learnt something about myself as it was pointed out to me that I excessively label and denounce all those about me. Genuinely however I do this because I want to encourage an argument and rarely truly mean it. And here a difference comes between my family and those I was with on the trip: the latter will generally engage with me head on, and the former will just roll their eyes. As Conor pointed out, I am absolutely in my element with that kind of group of people, constantly fighting a corner or making some sort of strange theory somehow plausible. And at the end of the day, my friends know I am like this and don’t resent it, and like me want to be challenged. I wonder however what things were learnt about me that are not so good, and how awkward I’m sure I am at times without realising it.

The competition hired out floors of restaurants for the two evening meals and this provided great opportunity for continued discussion. Alcohol obviously featured here, even for the seventeen year olds as they were merely having it with a meal. I really don’t mind this anymore, and actually people don’t change too much, maybe become nicer. I still however fail to understand fully why they then go away and drink themselves stupid and throw up everywhere, when in this situation they were quite happy with a more reasonably quantity. On the second evening a friend and I spoke a great deal to one of the judges, an executive in the competition’s sponsor, Pfizer. He was a very fair judge and had lots of interesting things to say, even if I disagreed with most of them. Most of us came away finding it difficult to maintain negative views of the drugs company after meeting their representatives. Additionally, I got locked in a rather one sided ‘debate’ with a Labour activist whose continual stream of speech was repeated to several of us. It was virtually impossible to escape it.

What was interesting here was how I was actually quite happy to spend hours over the meal, even though I was feeling a bit off and wasn’t eating very much. For years my parents have been sick of me attempting to rush off. This is because, I think, I was with people who would engage with me for once and argue properly, or they were already my friends and so things can always be discussed. Maybe I should be a better person and not make this requirement for having an extended conversation with people, but I appreciated the meaning of ‘good conversation’ in those two evenings in London, and on the walks back in the dark.

A fine three days in my element, with good friends, strangers and arguments.

The masterclass then was designed to give an introduction to the format and practice for those who wish to attend the trials for the World Schools Championship to be on the national team. We started of with an introduction as to how it worked, watched a debate by those more experience in the format, and then I was put into a group of three to prepare an opposition to “THW ban all religious clothing and symbols in schools”. I was put with an incredibly smart and intellectually agile Y10 and someone closer to my own ability, and we had a fair crack at it. There were so many holes in the prop’s case but then, we had plenty too, and we lost in the judge’s vote. They criticised us for not taking up several opportunities to tear apart the other side. I have no idea what my style was like, probably not fantastic, and not doing particularly well in that debate has soured my view of the whole day somewhat, which was really a very good event.

At the end various other events in debating coming up were advertised, and it would be so good to be able to be more involved in order to become more polished in more formal debating styles. The problem is that they all cost money, and even if bursaries are available you seem to generally have to apply first, and then potentially get a refund, which isn’t the way round I would like. Now, as usual, it is said that they don’t want anyone not to go due to financial constraints, but my situation is difficult. Simply put I’m not sure how much I can ask of my parents and school are useless at giving money for educational activities such as these. Yesterday was fine as it was just a train ticket. But I think I need to plan ahead and work out what to do in order not to miss opportunities as I have done so many times before. I nearly missed this one, having only had fourty-eight hours to apply.

However what was probably more interesting was observing the producer get to work behind the scenes while my comrades were on the air. What a fantastic job. With one touch screen managing the eight phone lines, switches allowing messages to be spoken into the presenter’s earphones, texts and e-mails coming in on another screen, sending instant messages to the presenter, checking that he has his volume sliders in the right place with another display… and then when things are quiet for a bit when Rony was talking away to one of us, they popped over to facebook. The producers were very happy to explain what they were doing and answer our questions: the main one had newsread and presented on Radio 4 so we were with good company! I learnt a lot about a very interesting job. One thing that stands out in my mind is how just before the news Rony gestured frantically as he was going through ‘this is BBC Radio Sheffield, now time for the news with…’ but after a quick grab of the ‘talkback’ microphone from the producer he was supplied and integrated flawlessly the newsreader’s name.

In the second debate our way of working really became obvious in the sense that it differed from the competition’s expectations. The motion was that ‘happiness should be a key goal of government policy’ and our side proposed this using the concept of eudaimonia, which we thought was a strong case that could provide a good debate. However, the judges attacked the lack of specific policies intended to bring about happiness – surely the motion was not about this! We tried to debate the motion, it seemed we were meant to be politicians. This meant that despite a poor case from the opposition we lost that round. However, due to the extremely complicated streaming system this still put us through to the final and the debaters for the second debate, Tom M-W and Andrew, went forward to oppose the motion that ‘excessive bureaucracy is keeping drugs from patients who need them’. The proposition read a prepared speech and kept repeating themselves, and Tom and Andrew managed to take it by providing and arguing with specific examples, and keeping to a team line. Thus we are through to the London final, with the intention of bringing along the whole squad of competative debaters for a valuable experience. MP3 players all round was another part of our victory (plus subscriptions to Britannica, brrr).

The issue with the focus of this competition was a problem for us, even if the format wasn’t. In fact, the format really did favour the intellectually very strong but less debating-experienced Tom, where the questioning suited his highly destructive style perfectly. For me, the speeches are too short and there is no chance to build up much of a case. But the competition’s focus on research was a problem for most of us. At the end of the first debate the chair told me (nicely!) that he thought I had given three minutes of virtually no actual material and that my speech had been a bit of a waste of time, in a sense. It may not have been perfect, but I believe I clearly laid out the case that the BBC’s quality and diversity could not remain if it were not publicly funded. Giving examples of programs and naming examples of controversies is not part of what debating should be about.

Whatever my criticisms of the competition, it is a great initiative for spreading debating to those who are less interested in oratory and rhetoric, so I really do salute the organisers (I signed up for the possible volunteers database for regional rounds). On to London, and to the battle there.

I was in general dissapointed with my performance as it was below my usual standard, but as usual at the moment it was because I seem to have lost my ability to be awake and mentally able as solidly as I used to. Mr Moore-Bridger remarked that I was ‘not quite in touch’ owtte with what was going on, and that pretty much summer it up – I was not on the ball in the way I usually am. This led to me not getting as much out of the session as I had hoped, but as always it is always worth practicing one’s skills. I am far more looking forward to the next round of the English Speaking Union’s Mace competition, which does include points for style which to me is pretty important. One thing that was very positive about this heat was that we got some real enthusiasm out of our budding year ten team. Debating has really taken off now that we are involving lots of different people; I am proud and glad that I started it off. Mixed teams are a most successful idea – as it has been noted, by the time they get up to the sixth form competitions they will be incredible. In the second debate we participated in we were drawn directly opposed to the other Silverdale team and this showed their skill.

One thing that was highlighted in the feedback from the judges is that structure and in some cases actual argument content was something that we all generally struggle with. However much we tell each other to signpost, it is in fact really hard to actually remember to do it in the middle of a debate. It is all too easy to forget your careful self-training and end up rambling on about some train of thought, only to then lose your audience. Keeping yourself on track when you are also having points of information hurled at you is difficult: we need to get better at it. The basic principle is to carefully lead your audience through an argument, avoiding leaps that make it in any way hard to follow and ensuring that they do not have to think to hard. Judges, apparently, look for three clear points and clear introductions and endings to each one: it must be obvious. So that was the most important thing for me about this competition; a solid target to aim for in improving the squad’s skills.

For this debate I was working with Conor, someone who I have not really worked with before but am glad I did – we seem to do well together. Conor won a public speaking competition recently and really can deliver the information. The big differnece that we had to cope with for this competition was interruptions during speeches in the form of points of information which is something we have not really had the chance to practice for, meaning that we probably didn’t handle these as well as we should have done. Really though this style of debate is so much better than the others we have encountered. The cut and thrust of real debate are there and this is not experienced in other settings. The debate is interactive and real. After watching the first debate on compulsory national service it was our turn, and we were stepping into a strange situation. We had little preparation due to being informed late of the details and we had been put off a little by the exceptional work of the home school in the first debate. But it was pointed out by our teachers that once we got into the style things were very fluid and debating did become theatre. Rebuttal is vitally important: I turned the proposition’s drop in a bucket argument on its head which I was quite pleased with.

We split our opposition into two areas: Conor took the economic issues around why fair trade is not a good thing, and I attacked the moral and human aspects, and then proposed a solution. We uncovered a lot of information and analysis. Firstly, Conor explained how fair trade does not address the reason that third world producers are paid so low for their produce and that is a saturated market – fair trade encourages more production and thus makes the situation a lot worse (worse not just not helping was a fundamental point of our side). He also explained how fair trade suffers from subsidy and import restrictions in first world countries and this led on to the proposition that cutting out the middleman of sending cocoa beans to the first world to be made into chocolate bars to be sold back to the third world would really help the situation in developing countries. I went on to talk about branding and how there is a real psychological element to the debate: fair trade is a fashionable brand at the moment and there is always the concern of complacency. We used the analogy of a sticking plaster for a much larger wound. The next point was the patronising of the African farmers that occurs. I used the illustration of a business meeting praising the African coffee and how this patronises those who have produced it: the pride in their produce is lost. So the solution came about from this argument. Take the extra fifty pence spend on fair trade and put this into developing the infrastructure in the developing countries to produce their own goods from the raw materials in order to allow them to compete. Remove this feudal situation between the first and third worlds where the subservant serfs are producing our raw materials, and if we must work within this capitalist system then we must allow the third world countries to compete rather than be below us if they are to lift themselves out of poverty.

After the debate the judges retired to consider the winning team to go through to the next round and a runner up in case illness or other misfortune should stop the winners attending. Firstly they did the most valuable part of the evening for the longer term: feedback on each individual debater and combined team. This information is absolutely invaluable in improving as the judges can compare teams and bring in their experience. According to the judges I have a voice that must be listened to without any shouting and I used my facial expressions well to emote my points. They particularly liked my point on why dependence on fair trade is particularly dangerous when I said that instant coffee could become instant poverty given an economic slump. We had a strong and coherent argument between us and Conor was praised for his solidity of economic research. Then the judgement came, and I was actually not too concerned for we had had a good time and had improved our skills. And then it came: we won – apparently the choice of winner for the judges was easy, and the runner up took more thought. On to the next round!

This particular format places great emphasis on questioning and speeches are relatively short and so the audience play a pivotal role – in some debates they really can dominate. So much is this considered vital that an award is given to the audience member who makes the best contributions from the floor – I received this in conjunction with another, which I was congratulated for. However, the issue with all this is that questions are ‘collected’ for the team to answer together. I really don’t like this because what ends up happening is that it breaks down and a two-way conversations at least partially ensues. I think the reasoning behind it is to give people a chance to think up a response but they are too busy scribbling down questions to be able to do this. In any case, the event was a success and I am pleased that I was there.

I am currently deciding whether or not to join the race for the Arbitration Committee this year. I am told by wikifriends that I stand a fair chance of being voted in (one, a former arbitrator, said that the worst outcome of it all would be being elected…) so it is worth doing as there is nothing to lose if I don’t succeed in gathering enough support to be appointed. I would like to do the job because I think I would be pretty good at it, simply put, and thus it is worth running for the position. It is something I could get into and get good at by being efficient with my time. The sucking of time that the job involves is of course the main reason against running, but I think that I could squash it in by reducing other activities. I think an important factor here is that I need to manage my time better to ensure that I can do all these things as I am sure that I can – the decision on whether to run or not rests on how well I can manage my time, and if I do post my candidate statement I will have decided that I can do it.

It was my seventeenth birthday on Saturday, and it has hit me how close I am to being eighteen, which concerns me somewhat. It was a pretty good day once I got back from work at twelve noon; along with my grandparents we went out for lunch and then opened some presents. Key presents are an exciting flash drive watch and Wikimedia and Wikipedia T-shirts. I also got a rather special box of crackers and various other things to eat, and surprisingly some clothes too, which is not usual for my birthdays. I also got a great deal of money which I added to my savings for building a computer, something which I am now aiming to do either at Christmas or over the half-term after that. Hopefully I won’t have an unreasonable amount of revision for the January exams because they are subjects I am not having problems with. So things are going pretty well in general, even if I rushed this post.

I have been holding off writing a post to report on how the new year has gone because I have been waiting until I was sure a particular issue which I will describe later was sorted. Now it has been, I am very happy with my situation: it is clear that my expectations during the latter part of last year that the Sixth Form would be a lot better than the previous five years were correct and I am finally enjoying learning again. I have said for five years that I “enjoy school but not secondary school” and this is no longer the case. I am enjoying my time now. There are so many things that are better.

For those who don’t know me, I am taking maths, further maths, history, physics and philosophy (shortened on my timetable to the unpronounceable “phphy”. I was also aiming to take politics but this wouldn’t timetable. I am glad that I was persuaded not to persue it as really, the work would have been too much and I wouldn’t be doing a lot else (such as writing this entry). However, it seems my attempts to do six AS levels caused the single politics group to have an awkward timetable and then I didn’t actually join it, as the teacher has been telling her pupils (or students – I generally object to this term but since officially we are and can join the NUS in the Sixth Form, I am being somewhat less verbal about it). My subjects are working out very well; maths is great but I hope it doesn’t get too hard once we end the rehashing of GCSE material. My marks are looking fine at the moment. Physics is also interesting but a lot of it is just the same as mechanics lessons, which is good for reinforcement but can also be a bit boring and repetative at times. However, after Christmas, we go on to “Waves, Particles and Quantum Phenomenon” which is very exciting. After Christmas, I will have half an A-level in maths, which is an interesting thought.

History isn’t quite so positive. For two major assessment points, that is the end of Y9 and of course my GCSEs, I have underperformed in this subject and I’m never quite sure why. I do find in intermediate tests and thought I enjoyed it; I certainly find the study facinating. However, I seem to like it less and less as I am always unsure that I am doing the right amount and critically the right direction of work. A-level is different to GCSE – there is more knowledge and more essay writing, but at least it is only one question per exam. While I suspect I will drop this after Y12 (I don’t know yet of course, but out of the four it seems the most likely right now) I do intend to work hard to get that A, even if I am not very good at it. I am always unsure of my ability and this doesn’t make it too much fun.

Despite the fact I have only had two taught hours of it and thus it is hard to make a fair judgement, philosophy is looking very good at the moment. The group is interesting and wants to engage and is a pretty good size, so it should be a way to add some arguments to my convictions… There is at least one arrogant one in there who can be engaged in debate. Debating within the school is hopefully changing this year too with the return of “Debating X-Treme”, a group for more formal debating. We are pulling in more people from the English department to popularise it and now that Mr Moore-Bridger is finally in every day of the week things are a lot better because as a pupil it was pretty hard for me to organise anything proper. We are having internal competitions to decide on a team to go forward to national things which we miserably failed at organasing before and this is positive. Mr M-B has suggested that we also ask the Debating Society, “the thing which started it all”, to act as an audience and to try and formalise debating more there. My opinion is that this would be great as our own self-developed style doesn’t allow a great deal of depth, but we will propose it to the group and hope they are willing. I have no desire to force it upon them as this would be totally unfair as I am concerned they may not be willing to put in the extra work. But we shall see.

My posts often seem to contain the notion that I am busy in some way, probably because I am writing them whilst thinking “arg, I haven’t updated my blog for a while because I have been so busy”. This is definately the case now and I am completely snowed under with homework most of the time. It is infact rather ridiculus at times in the sense that I don’t do a lot else. At the weekend I only got about six hours, not including my job on a Saturday morning, at home working on Wikimedia, freenode and SilentFlame which seems rather short. However, Tim from my newsagent tells me that they pile it on in the first few weeks to ‘prove’ that the Sixth Form is harder work and hopefully it will ease off. I certainly hope so, otherwise I won’t have a lot of time for my other activities and this will be mad. I have given up Oxfam every week to do it in the school holidays only already and I don’t want to have to give up more. This may of course be because I am putting in a lot of effort, but that represents History where I am working very hard for obvious reasons.

As promised, I will go over the reason that it took me so long to update my blog with school, aside from a lack of time (tonight I have slightly less homework and tomorrow morning free to do it in). Back in May/June, I had been told that it would be requested that I be put in a particular form next year, one with a teacher I knew well and that was based in the library, where I live. However, come the Sixth Form induction I did not get this form and was rather surprised, so decided to immeadiately chase it up, knowing it ought to be achieved before the proper school holiday. I was told that a member of staff had expressed concerns that I was not branching out enough by being attached to the library. Surprised that the member of staff who made the request was seemingly not being listened to, my mother wrote into the school to request reconsideration. For the past three weeks I have been fighting hard for the form change, something which required a great deal of time and effort on my part. But I believe I was victorious through my perseverance and am now where I want to be. I am happy that things will be that bit easier in that form. Everything is sorted for a great year.