1. The Ministry of Education (MOE) congratulates the team that represented Singapore in the 21st World Schools Debating Championships (WSDC) for emerging third in the championships held in Athens from 9 to 19 February. Singapore came in third out of 39 participating countries, after New Zealand and England. This is a remarkable improvement over last year’s placing at the 10th spot.
2. Three of our debaters also garnered accolades for Best Individual Speaker awards in the championships. Teoh Ren Jie from Raffles Institution (Secondary), Anish Hazra and Lee Jia Wei from Raffles Institution (Junior College) came in 4th, 5th and 9th respectively as Best Individual Speaker, making Singapore the best represented country on the list. England came in next, with three speakers ranked 6th, 7th and 10th.
3. The other members on the Singapore team were Benjamin Mak from Raffles Institution (Secondary) and Rachael Quah from Raffles Institution (Junior College). The team was coached by Mrs Geetha Creffield and Mr Ngoei Wen-Qing from Anglo-Chinese Junior College and managed by Team Manager Madam Evelyn Woels, a Curriculum Specialist from MOE.
Background
4. WSDC is an English language international debating competition held annually for debaters aged between 14 to 19 years old. Singapore has participated in this competition since its inception in 1995. The WSDC debates feature a combination of prepared and impromptu rounds, with teams having only one hour to prepare for the latter. Teams go through 8 preliminary rounds, after which the top 16 teams face each other in the Octo-finals, which is a knock-out round, followed by the quarter-finals, the semi-finals and the Grand Final.
5. MOE selects national debaters to represent Singapore in international competitions including the WSDC through the ‘Junior Colleges Debating Championships’ (JCDC) which started in 1994. With the introduction of the integrated programme schools and specialised schools, the JCDC was renamed the ‘MOE Invitational Debating Championship’ (MIDC) in 2007. MIDC now draws talent from junior colleges, centralised institute, integrated programme schools, specialised schools, polytechnics and foreign system schools in Singapore. National debaters selected to represent Singapore in international competitions include Singapore citizens and permanent residents.