Talented debaters Finn Kerby-Pinguet (centre right) and Stella Bloomfield (bottom left) recently joined students from other schools to represent NZ at the prestigious online Western World Schools Debating Championships held on 4th - 5th February.

The New Zealand teams were:

• Katie Li (St Peters Cambridge); Clara Ballantyne (Columba College); and Stella Bloomfield (Nayland College)
• Riley Nicholls (Waimea College); Finn Kerby-Pinguet (Nayland College); and Jamie Pett (Avondale College)

After six preliminary rounds, both New Zealand teams advanced to the Novice Grand-Final. Riley, Finn and Jamie ultimately won the Novice division, with Katie, Clara, and Stella placing as runners-up. 

New Zealand was highly successful in speaker awards, with Clara being named 9th equal 'Best Novice Speaker,' Katie being named 7th 'Best ESL Speaker,' and Finn being named 'Best Speaker' of the Novice Finals. This was an incredible result, especially given that round one of the tournament began at 3:00am New Zealand time!

Western WSDC is hosted by the University of Western Ontario, and is the first major international schools tournament of the WSDC calendar, and consisted of over 80 teams representing 17 countries. In attendance were the national and development teams of Canada, Germany, Hong Kong, Kenya, Lithuania, Mexico, Morocco, Poland, Scotland, and Singapore.

Finn and Stella participated in regular online training and practice debates with their NZ teams throughout the summer in order to prepare for this event.

https://www.debating.org.nz/summer-development-culminates-in-victory-at-western-wsdc/05/02/