The World Universities Debating Championship 2015 in Malaysia has its champions:And the winners are...The Open CategorySydney A (Edward Miller, Nick Chung) won the final in the Open Category. They debated the motion "This House believes that humanitarian organisations should, and should be allowed to, give funding, resources or services to illegal armed groups when this is made a condition for access to vulnerable civilians." and won against Oxford A (Patrick Bateman, Natasha Rachman) in Opening Government, BPP A  (Steven Rajavinothan, Michael O'Dwyer) in Opening Opposition and Harvard A (Bo Seo, Fanelesibonge Mashwama) in Closing Opposition. The final was adjudicated by Shafiq Bazari (chair), Dominic ...

The World Universities Debating Championship 2014 has its winners: The World Champion 2014 in the category “English as a foreign language” is Bandung A (Vicario Reinaldo and Fauzan Reza Maulana). The World Champion 2014 in the category “English as a second language” is Berlin A (Dessislava Kirova and Kai Dittmann). The World Champion 2014 is Harvard A (Josh Zoffer and Ben Sprung-Keyser). ESL Semi Final Motion: This House believes that Pope Francis should publicly encourage Catholics to support radically redistributive government policies. Break into ESL Final: Babes-Bolyai A (Radu Cotarcea, Octavian Vasile Buta) Lund A (Peer Klüßendorf, Emilia Carlqvist) Belgrade B (Helena Ivanov, Stefan Siridzanski) Berlin A (Dessislava Kirova, ...

On the 2nd of January 2014 several out-rounds of different language categories took place. Three German teams are still in the competition. Here are the result and the motions:   Open Double Octo Finals Motion: This House would abolish gated communities in the developing world. Break into Open Octo-Finals: Otago B (John Brinsley-Pirie, Patrick Dawson) Monash B (Nisha Dutta, Beatrice Paull) IIUM A (Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman, Mubarrat Wassey) Stanford A (Ilya Gaidarov, Andrew Suciu) Western University A (Victoria Hale, Brent Schmidt) Yale B (Zach Bakal, Sesenu Woldemariam) UCTA A, (David Harris, James Wink) Monash C (Andrew Gaulke, Thomas Stansfield) Sydney C (Evangeline Woodforde, Daniel Farinha) Cambridge C (Frederick Powell, Michael Dunn Goekjian) Glasgow ...

The break of the World Universities Debating Championship has been announced. The following teams will compete in the out-rounds on the 2nd of January: Open Break Teams / Points, direct break to Open Octo-Finals 1 University of Sydney Union B / 26 (Eleanor Jones, Chris Bisset) 2 Cambridge Union Society A / 22 (Thomas Simpson, Ashish Kumar) 3 Monash University A / 21 (James Beavis, Gemma Buckley) 4 Harvard University A / 21 (Josh Zoffer, Ben Sprung-Keyser) 5 McGill University A / 21 (Cole Bricker, Sarah Balakrishnan) 6 University of Canterbury A / 21 (Tom O'Brien, Tim Bain) 7 University of Cape Town B / 21 (Yashodhan Nair, Daniel Corder) 8 ...

Criticism has mounted about several aspects of the organisation of the World Universities Debating Championship (WUDC) 2014. After problems arose regarding the accommodation of the participants during the first days of the tournament, the failure to fulfil payment of travel subsidies to independent adjudicators threatened to derail the tournament on the last day of 2013. Adjudication Strike In order to insure quality adjudication at worlds, it has become common that organizers of the competition offer travel subsidies for independent adjudicators. This year, several judges were selected as independent adjudicators and offered subsidies to cover the costs of their travel to Chennai. ...

From the 26th of December 2013 until the 4th of January 2014, the biggest and most important international tournament of the year, the World Universities Debating Championship (WUDC), takes place in Chennai, India. After participants of all over the world arrived in the Indian megacity on the 26th and 27th of December, the tournament officially began on the 28th with the Grand Opening. On the 29th, the first three preliminary rounds took place – time to present a first summary and portray some impressions. Accomodation Most of the participants are accommodated in 2- to 3-bed rooms in the five-star hotels of the ...

In 2014 the World University Debating Championship will take place in Chennai. This week, the adjudication team, consisting in Harish Natajaran, Michael Baer, Ely Zosa, Michael Shapira, Fiona Prowse and Steven Whittington, published a Preliminary Briefing for the participants. You can find the original text here: As many individuals and institutions begin preparing for WUDC over the coming months, the Chennai Worlds Adjudication Team thought it would be helpful to provide some guidance on policies that we will be adopting. The vast majority of this year’s briefings (including much of what follows) will match last year’s briefings in Berlin. We want to ...

For the Malaysian delegation the WUDC 2013 has been a great success. They won the bid to organize Worlds 2015 and broke directly into Open Octos. After the Octos we spoke with the members of the Malaysian Team, Syed Soddiq and Arinah Najwa. Achte Minute: You’re ESL speakers but made the direct break to the Open Octos. Would you like to reveal your secrets? Arinah: It’s our second WUDC together as a team. Last year in Manila, we got to the ESL Final and lost. Since then, we trained every day individually and at least one time a week as a team. Syed: ...

[caption id="attachment_14099" align="alignleft" width="400"] James Beavis and Nita Rao with our reporter Anna Mattes (c) WUDC pretty pictures[/caption]This morning, right after the open semi finals of WUDC, Achte Minute spoke to Nita Rao and James Beavis from the team Monash B from Australia. Tonight it turns out we picked the right team and actually talked to the new world champions. In total, four Australian teams made it through to the open semi finals. Achte Minute: You just finished your debate. How did it go? Were you nervous? Nita: We were really nervous. The topic was really hard. I’m not an economist, but ...

Marietta Gädeke is Chief of Staff of the WUDC. She has recruited, organized and motivated a team of over 200 volunteers from all around the world. Martin Funck, Chief Editor of the wudcwatch, talked to her. [caption id="attachment_14059" align="alignleft" width="240"] Marietta Gädeke, Chief of Staff, after 4 days of work for WUDC 2013[/caption] Martin Funck: Two hundred sounds like a lot. How did you organize such a large team? Marietta: It took us two days to get things going. Our original plan how to allocate personnel resources didn’t work. So we changed our system dramatically: Now, our volunteer dispatchment uses a huge wall ...

The WUDC Berlin 2013 is creating a massive press echo. Mayor German newspapers write about the Championships, radio stations have live interviews with WUDC staff and even the first camera team came to the TU yesterday. For the press review, please read the German verision of this article.

Igor Gilitschenski, Michael Saliba and Nils Haneklaus from Debattierclub Stuttgart won the final of the first ZEIT DEBATTEN of 2012/2013.  They defeated  Friederike Meyer zu Wendischhoff, Jonathan Scholbach and Severin Weingarten from Debattiergesellschaft Jena. Almut Graebsch, Georg Sommerfeld and Jan Ohmstedt broke to the final as Free speekers. The final was judged by Teresa Widlok, Alexander Labinski, Robert Büchle and the three CAs Philipp Stiel, Wiebke Nadler and Leo Vogel. sol

Stuttgart (Nils Haneklaus, Michael Saliba, Igor Gilitschenski), Berlin (Annette Kirste, Georg Sommerfeld, Julian Ohm), Jena (Severin Weingarten, Jonathan Scholbach, Friederike Meyer zu Wendischhoff) and Mainz (Marina Freund, Max Fritz, Willy Witthaut) broke to semis. Severin Weingarten topped the tab. As Free Speakers broke Marc-André Schulz  (Aachen), Gabor Stefan, Almut Graebsch (beide München), Barbara Schunicht (Hamburg), Adrian Gombert (Münster) and Jan Ohmstedt (Heidelberg Debating). As adjudicators broke: Hauke Blume (Berlin Debating Union), Daniil Pakhomenko, Andrea Gau (beide Mainz), Teresa Peters (Leipzig), Marion Seiche (Frankfurt), Alexander Karl Postl (Leipzig), Andreas C. Lazar (Stuttgart), Teresa Widlok (Münster), Robert Büchle (Zürich), Alexander Labinsky (Dresden), Tom-Michael ...