Our debating society represented us in a number of local and national competitions this half term. A team of Year 10 students travelled to the University of Sheffield in January to participate in the Ethics Cup.
The team drew their first match and lost their second but performed incredibly well against Sixth Form opposition. This competition gives students the opportunity to use ethical and philosophical reasoning to approach a range of moral dilemmas. The topics in this year’s case set the morality of true crime TV shows and video games to charity shop upcycling and regifting. While preparing for the competition, our students had several Zoom lessons with a PHD mentor from St Andrew’s University, who supported them in applying different philosophical approaches to the problems posed by the study cases. As well as presenting their ideas in two closely fought matches, the team had the chance to tour the University of Sheffield and speak to students about university life.
We also travelled to Abbey Grange Academy to participate in the qualifying round of the Leeds Salon. After a lively evening of debate and discussion between two schools who have won this competition twice in recent years, our team narrowly lost both debates. Well done everyone!
