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The Schools Mace has been encouraging the discussion of controversial topics and current affairs since 1957. The competition is the largest and oldest schools debating tournament in the country, and former winners have gone on to be MPs, well-known journalists, captains of industry, senior lawyers, and prominent scientists. Establishments of all types enter the competition: further education colleges, comprehensives, private schools, grammar schools, schools with and without sixth forms, specialist status schools and city academies. The 2008 international champions were Michael Sinclair and Sarah O’Neill from Dalriada School, a grammar school in Northern Ireland. All schools in England can enter the competition on this website. Schools in Scotland should enter through ESU Scotland. Schools in Wales and Ireland have their own national competitions, the Julian Hodge Cup run by CEWC-Cymru, and the All-Ireland Schools Debating Competition run by a consortium of Irish university debating societies. The winners from all four of these national competitions will meet at the ESU’s own International Final on 2 May in The Temple of Peace, Cardiff, by kind permission of the Welsh Centre for International Affairs (the parent body of CEWC-Cymru).
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Get training for this year’s competitionThis September we will be running a road show of workshops around the country. Open to any school taking part in the upcoming championship, they cost £50 per school, for which you can bring up to five students (perhaps your first team and your reserve team) and as many staff as you wish. If you got knocked out in the first round of last year’s competitions, the sessions are free! Debate AcademyThere are still places for the ESU’s debate summer school, Debate Academy. Held at Oakham School from 25 to 28 July, it offers intensive coaching to individuals aged 14-18 (there is no need for them to be accompanied by their own teacher) from some of the best schools debate coaches in the world. Advance dates for 2009The first and second rounds of the competition are arranged by the schools taking part in the individual heats between October and February. However, to help you plan in advance, we have fixed the dates of all later rounds. Judging the national championshipThe ESU Schools Mace, more than any other debating competition, relies on the generosity of large numbers of people—the debating community, teachers, ESU branch members and members of the public—who give up their time to assess the early heats. At the heart of the ESU’s beliefs about debate is the conviction that it should represent real-world persuasive skills and debate skill can be evaluated by intelligent and fair-minded lay people with no special expertise in competitive debate. If you are interested in helping the competition to run, you could be an adjudicator. Please get in touch with us by e-mailing centre@esu.org. |
The online home of the ESU Centre for Speech and Debate.
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