Royal School, Armagh

APRIL 2011 - The Royal School teams display debating excellence!

Teams from the Senior Debating Society at the Royal School have taken part in not 1 but 3 prestigious competitions recently.
Senior students won through to the Regional Finals of the Institute of Ideas ‘Debating Matters’ competition on 31st March in Edinburgh. The event which is supported by the Medical Research Council will take place at the University of Edinburgh’s Informatics Centre.

Marking the first year that Northern Ireland has formally taken part in the competition dubbed ‘the toughest in the UK’; the school has already proved its credentials in the competition that takes no prisoners.

In their qualifying round, students James Heatley and Rachel Kane were interrogated on genetic screening of embryos by a distinguished panel of judges including writer and broadcaster Newton Emerson and Prof Bert Rima Headof the School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences at QUB.

Their team mates, Jamie Baird and Davina Whiteside were equally cogent on extremist religious and terrorist groups on campus.

The teams debated their way to the final. The students shone in their grasp of such issues as the rights and wrongs of economic incentives for healthy behaviour, legal rights for great apes and the consequences ‘Wikileaks’. Opponents Dalriada won through to the UK finals in London.

On the same day in Cavan, two more teams accepted the challenge from the four other Royal Schools in this year’s annual 1608 Debate. Last year the Harry West Cup was awarded to the Royal School Armagh. This year Victoria Armstrong and Andrew Glenny will take on The Royal School Dungannon to debate whether free university education is a luxury while Jack Kennedy and Claire Mortimer will debate Portora on the motion that a European super-state is a dangerous entity.
Finally James Heatley will be going to Stormont on 15th April to compete in the final of Best Individual Speaker at the 2011 Finals of the Northern Ireland Schools’ Debating Competition. This highly prestigious debating competition attracted over 80 schools this year and 15th April sees the culmination of months of rounds. Two teams and 6 individuals will take up the challenge in front of an audience of politicians, writers and business leaders. James will speak on the role of social networks as forces for revolution.

The strength and depth of debating in the Royal has meant that the school is now regarded as one of the ‘big beasts’ in the debating jungle and we wish all our teams continued good hunting!