On Monday 28thDecember 2020, the annual QMES Debating Competition was held in Personal Development Planning 1 (PDP1). This year the topic under debate was “who is the greatest scientist?” This is the fourth year the competition has been held and it is a highlight of the year 1 calendar, with students competing for the prestigious QMES Debating Trophy.
The 2020 cohort of first year students had competed over the previous two weeks to win support for their argument from their peers, thereby gaining a place in the debate final. During the rounds, groups argued for and against a scientist who had made a significant contribution to a specific field. Students were required to present their position and then, using rebuttal language, find flaws in their opposing teams' argument. Students also addressed questions at the end of the debate from the audience. In total, 6 groups out of 20 debate teams qualified to compete in the final from each degree programme. After the initial final round debates, the three winning teams faced off in the final by presenting a final 1-2 minute argument highlighting the key reasons why their scientist should be crowned as the greatest - the winner being crowned by audience vote.
In polymers, P4 (Tu Youyou), P15(Antonie Lavoisier), P14 (Albert Einstein), P19 (Louis Pasteur), P7 (Donald Kunth) and P2 (Charles Goodyear) fought, with P2, P14 and P15 getting through to the final argument. It was a closely fought battle, but in the end P2 were crowned victorious with 44% of the votes, followed by P14 and P15 with 32% and 24% of the votes respectively.
The materials battle was even closer. M8 (Max Plank), M16 (Peidong Yang), M4 (Antonio Meucci), M17 (Heinrich Hertz), M5 (Henry Moseley) and M13 (Francis Bacon)debated, with M4, M5 and M16 going through to the final argument. M16 were victorious, securing victory by a mere 1 vote (39%) with M5 and M4 gaining 38% and 22% of the votes respectively.
By competing in this debate, students are able to practice academic skills such as debating and academic argument, research skills, communication skills, teamwork skills and report writing. This competition gives students the opportunity to compete against each other and also engage in peer-to-peer learning, whilst also learning about different scientists in a fun and engaging way.
Overall, the debate contest was a great success and showed the fantastic abilities of the year 1 students. Well done!
Materials Winners: M16 (from left to right) Zhingyan Hong, Chaoyue Han, Yulu Zhang, Pufan Han, Jiayue Xu, Mingxuan Ren.
Polymers Winners: P2 (from left to right) Zhiwei Zhang, Zixuan Liu, Liusiyuan He, Yaowen Ye, Hao Li, Jinhao Liu.
