“BOP On Top” was the unofficial slogan of the New Zealand School National Debating Championship 2024 for good reason, as the Bay of Plenty regional debating team — composed of Ollie Farquharson, Luca Ririnui, James Bunyun and reserve Gayathri Dinesh — smashed the competition.

“The event was held over the weekend from the 24th to the 27th of May, and was truly a wonderful experience, especially as a reserve. Exempt from the stress of a region's expectations on my back, my weekend was spent listening in on incredibly high-quality debates, watching Mean Girls in the auditorium during prep time, and making friends with amazing people from across the country. Despite not debating myself, my debating skills improved from listening to teams fire quips at each other from the podium, making it an incredibly worthwhile experience.”

• Gayathri Dinesh (Year 13)

Over three days the team not only managed to squeeze seven excellent debates out of their wrought brains but won an astonishing six of them, advancing to the semi-final round in first place. They are the first Bay of Plenty team to do so since the region's recognition, making them the most successful BOP team ever.

They were (unfairly, in this reserve's opinion) knocked out in the semi-final round. It was a very narrow loss, as evidenced by the split judging panel. However, this isn’t where their achievements ended.

During the event-end prizegiving held in parliament, Ollie Farquharson received an award for being the Most Promising Speaker at the competition, despite being one of the youngest competitors of the weekend. Let it be known that this announcement caused the team’s coaches, Melissa Connolly and Ella Mitchell, to burst into tears.

Even more incredibly, Luca Ririnui earned a spot on the New Zealand National Debating Team and will be participating in this year's World Schools Debating Championship, held in Serbia this year. We do not doubt that he’ll do wonderfully, and wish him infinite energy for his travels!

Article by Gayathri Dinesh