Monash debaters show world-class skills

The Monash Association of Debaters (MAD) has built upon its past successes by taking first place in the international debating competition, the Red Sea Open.

Monash Pro Vice-Chancellor (International) Dr Abid Khan congratulated both teams’ success in the event.

“Monash’s representation at the Red Sea Open demonstrates the ability of our students to embrace and succeed in a global context,” Dr Khan said.

"Monash continues to support opportunities for students and the debaters should be congratulated for their efforts in the competition and their valuable contribution to Monash’s engagement globally."

MAD Vice President, Stephen Moore said the team performed extraordinarily well under the circumstances they were placed in.

“We only got the teams confirmed a few weeks out from the competition, so it was all go from the first minute we heard about it. The team also had the unfortunate circumstance of one team member having to withdraw less than a week before we were due to leave but luckily we were able to replace them at the last minute,” Stephen said.

The tournament, hosted by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, is open to teams from around the world. Four of the team members also won places in the top eight best individual debater rankings.

The two MAD teams consisted of Gemma Buckley and Colette Mintz, who won the tournament, and the second team was Kiran Iyer and Meredith Prior.

Preparations for the competition were helped by the fact the debaters were firm friends before even being selected for the tournament and so required a lot less preparation than most other teams.

In addition their collective experience in having competed at the Australasian Debating Championship in July early this year, they were able to carry over a lot of work they had done for this tournament.

However, Stephen said the two teams’ biggest learning experience from the tournament came from being in Israel for the first time.

“While we spend a lot of our time learning and debating about the Middle East, it was quite another thing to actually be in the region, and to see and interact with its people,” Stephen said.

"Everything from the intense security at the airport to the atmosphere of the cities gave a whole new dimension to what we had only ever read about on paper, and even the university environment itself, was very different."

Not a team to rest on their laurels, MAD has a number of events in the pipelines. 

“MAD was recently victorious at the new online debating initiative, WUPID Online, and is currently preparing for the World Universities’ Debating Championships to be held in Berlin at the end of December,” Stephen said. 

Sure to build on their successes, the Monash community should watch this space.