Debate: We almost did it!

Last friday I had the chance to participate once more with The Mackay School's Debate Team at the grange. We went to Santiago after school because we had two opponents waiting for us: Colegio Cumbres and Santiago College.

As we arrived there, the organization of the event informed us that the Colegio Cumbres' team had had a problem and that they couldn't attend the event. However, we had the chance to debate against the grande C team, just for the fun of it. Our position was against the motion "This house would eliminate standardized tests in chilean primary and secondary education". Our first speaker was Mr Rodriguez, I was the second, and Mr Pavon was the third.

As of my arguments, I stated that Standardized tests (not just PSU, but also Simce, Pisa, and others) are the only way to measure the student's knowledge, and they do their job well. The other team said that we could replace them with interviews, but obviously it's impossible to use interviews as they are subjective and the results would depend not only on the student, but on the examiner.

After this "fun" debate, my partners, Mr Barriga, Mr Park and Mr Pavon, debated against the Santiago College's team. They managed to do an awesome job, they actually impressed me. Unfortunately, we couldn't beat the opposite team. This means that our participation in the ESU debate competition finished.

Although we didn't have good results this year, I think we have improved a lot. I don't want to sound like a conformist, but I think we have learnt and developed our debating skills greatly, and next year, older and smarter, we will have better results. Finally, I must thank my debating mates and Miss Lydia!