Dear School Community
The Junior Speakers Debating Challenge at Light International School was a great experience for all of us. We were divided into two teams: Natalie, Minah, Ameen and Aimee in one team and Leonarda, Alara, Umaiza and I in the other. Naledi was part of the group, but she gave speeches on other topics.
We had practiced for weeks, and when the big day came, we were super prepared. The tournament started at 9:00 am on Saturday the 14th. In the first round, Alara, Leonarda and I competed against Light International School. Unfortunately Umaiza could not play because she was sick the day before. All the teams were split up and placed in separate rooms. Aimee, Mina and Natalie competed against Nora Pioneer in the first round and we all won.
In the second round, my team consisting of Leonarda, Alara, and I competed against Light Academy Team C. We were joined by. Minah, Ameen, Natalie, and Aimee competed against Light Academy Team F. Pretty cool, right?
There were different trophies to win – the main trophy, the gold trophy, the silver trophy, and the bronze trophy. If you won all the rounds, you got the main cup. If you missed only one round, you got the gold cup, and so on.
In the semifinals, my team faced Crawford, and unfortunately, we lost because we fell for their tricks. But our other team, Team B, won against Light Academy Team C in the semifinals. Team B made it to the finals of the main cup against Crawford, and we were in the finals of the Gold Cup against another Light International team. Excitingly, both teams won their respective finals – the Main Cup and the Gold Cup.
The trophy wasn’t the only thing we won. Each of us was scored individually by the judges in each round on a scale of one to 100. These scores were our speaker points, for which we received medals. In the end, we all made it into the top 30. It was great and showed that the preparation really paid off!
Layla Stein
Debate Club