WSDA 2024 冬季冠军赛火热进行中！

“年度大战”——WSDA 2024 冬季冠军赛 中学组的比赛 于今日正式拉开了序幕~

对于每位辩手与演讲者，辩论与演讲就是他们生活中不可或缺的重要部分。不论身处何地，他们始终在WSDA的赛场上挥洒热情，不断向上攀登，为自己的人生博出精彩的一笔又一笔。

冬季冠军赛高手云集，参赛即为一种荣誉，老师对每一位参加比赛的辩手们都报以敬意，希望你们无论比赛输赢都要保持一颗平和的心态，不骄不躁不屈不挠；懂得悉心钻研，细腻处事，努力付出的重要性，以及及时调整自己的状态。

最后，为大家点播一首《好运来》，祝愿所有的选手都能在本次WSDA冬季冠军赛的比赛中满载而归！

开幕式精彩回顾WSDA Winternational Championship

01、Luck is when preparation meets opportunity

“Word that came up time and time again when I looked it up. And that was luck. So. Remember. People make their own luck.

Luck is when preparation meets opportunity. ”

- Cale Halley

Cale在开幕式的发言中回顾了WSDA校友的光辉岁月和成功事迹，他们在各个领域都取得了优异成绩，但他们不止于此，他们都成为了很优秀的“大人”，并成为致力于回馈社会的富有同情心的人。他们成为不仅为自己，也努力为他人创造最好的生活的人。

他说道：“请务必把这次比赛当作一次机会。每个人都能从中获得最大的收获。这意味着不仅要努力获胜，还要努力以正确的方式获胜。努力赢得荣誉，赢得尊重。无论辩论输赢，都要以自己引以为豪的方式获胜。”

Cale强调了诚信和尊重在比赛中的重要性，敦促参赛选手关注个人成长和荣誉行为，而非仅仅着眼于获胜。借鉴龙的象征意义，鼓励辩论者进行批判性思考并运用逻辑进行论证，强调准备工作在创造成功机会中的作用。

最后，他祝愿所有参赛选手都能在比赛中取得好成绩，并强调了努力准备和随时准备抓住机会的重要性。

02、成长来自于胜利也来自于失败

在裁判代表Vera Zhao的发言中，她提到自己很荣幸能担任WSDA冬季冠军赛的评委，也很感谢能有机会继续她的WSDA之旅。

Vera提到自己对辩论的热情始于高中，辩论为当时的她提供了一种高级微积分之外的选择，并向她介绍了逻辑推理和批判性思维。

Vera说道：“尽管最初遇到了很多挑战，包括在斯坦福邀请赛上我和我的搭档奋力拼搏的难忘经历，但我们坚持不懈，不断学习，最终在地区、国家和国际级别的比赛中取得了成功。”

辩论极大地影响了Vera的职业选择，推动她走上了法律之路，至今她仍能看到法律工作与辩论之间的相似之处。

Vera很感谢辩论给她上的宝贵一课，她鼓励着大家带着激情和毅力参加这次比赛，要知道成长来自于胜利和失败。祝所有参赛者好运。

Good morning everyone. I am one of the judges for the tournament and I am extremely grateful that I got the opportunity to continue my journey with WSDA as a judge, share my debate experience, and talk about how it has empowered me academically and professionally today.

My debate journey started 10 years ago when I was in high school. I actually signed up for it to avoid taking advanced calculus, and it turned out to be one of the best decisions I made. I remember walking into the debate classroom and seeing my coach outlining the fundamentals of public forum debate on the whiteboard during my first debate class. That day, the concept of debate itself attracted me instantaneously. Until middle school, the education I received has always placed great emphasis on giving standardized answers: the lessons we learn from history should be similar, and the rationales behind policies are always fixed. Public forum debate showed me the possibility of using logical reasoning and substantive evidence to cast doubt on the irrational and think critically about the potential pros and cons of certain policies. More importantly, it constantly challenged me to explore disciplines in which I had zero knowledge, enabling me to become receptive of the different voices and perspectives.
Apparently, I got way too excited at the beginning and encountered great challenges during the Stanford invitational tournament. Out of all the preliminary rounds, my partner and I won 1 round, because our opponent didn’t show up. Whenever I share this story with people, they always ask why I still remember it —- I mean, it was kinda hard to forget. I remember clearly that as we lost more rounds, I got so freaked out that I started to forget what the evidence was about; I accidentally mispronounced words; and in one extreme case, I started arguing for the other side. Eventually, all the frustration turned into great self doubt, which made me realize how much more I needed to learn and practice. My partner and I went from classroom to classroom to watch other debaters compete, learned the skills we lacked and practiced repeatedly. We then started winning more — from regional to national, and to international tournaments.

My debate experience has profoundly impacted me. Because I enjoyed researching, writing and making arguments so much, I became interested in the legal profession and entered law school. It’s fascinating how I still find a lot of parallels between the legal work I do now and the work I did as a debater back in high school. Whenever I read cases and court documents, I feel like I am reading the evidence packet; whenever I interview clients’ employees for internal investigations, I feel like I am doing crossfire.

I am so grateful for everything that debate has taught me. As you will start your tournament soon, I just wanted to let you know that you’ve all done your work and you will do great, and even if you lose sometimes, it is completely okay because as long as you have enough passion for debate, your passion will help you power through difficult times and become better. Thank you all and best of luck on your tournament.

03、团队合作、沟通和包容

在校园大使代表Willard Mou的发言中，Willard分享了他作为WSDA校园大使的心路历程，强调了组织辩论活动和促进讨论的乐趣。

他强调了代表社区声音的重要性，并为有抱负的校园大使提供了建议：通过宣传吸引学校加入社团、有效沟通并举办令人难忘的活动。

Hello everyone!

My name is Willard Mou, a sophomore currently studying at the American International School of Guangzhou (AISG). I’m sure many of yall also know me for being the reigning champion of WSDA winter invitationals last year.

Being this unique role of a WSDA captain punched me with these endless stories. Just last week, AISG hosted a remarkable debate event with Basis International School Of Guangzhou regarding the fall case of whether “The benefits of resource extraction in the Arctic Circle outweigh the harms.” What I saw was in fact truly remarkable; debaters from both schools came out with laughter and happiness on their faces. From being an average high school student to taking over the debate club at our school and hosting debate events with the top international schools in our community, embarking on this journey as a WSDA captain has been nothing short of exhilaration. Every speech I perceived is not just the representation of ideas, but a celebration of power of discourse. It’s like an emotional rollercoaster, fueling commitment to my role of organizing events for our speech and debate club. But it was these moments that I find the true essence of my role for representing AISG as a WSDA captain. I feel privileged to be able to learn my role from a WSDA captain through means of understanding to raise awareness of the absence voices in our community.

Ok but that’s enough of what I accomplished as a WSDA captain. The reason why I am here is I want “you” to be the best captain in the future. Through this 3-minute speech, I don’t want “me” to be heard, but I want “we” to be heard. I want to share some advice to y’all out there is interested in starting a school speech and debate club, or anyone who does speech and debate in his or her school.

First let’s start by calling upon the success of any sort of club. You need a sufficient number of members. This can be achieved by advertising in you school community. For example, hanging up posters in school about an upcoming event or writing an article regarding your club in your school’s newspaper website.

Next, communicate with your club members. Along with two other student coordinators, I had the chance to work with the best and talented individuals in our debate club. Whether it's conducting workshops, facilitating mock debates, or providing assistance in researching with them goes beyond world of debate. It's about instilling confidence, fostering critical thinking, and creating an environment where diverse voices are not just heard but celebrated.

Lastly, it is time to host debates. Have the event be the most memorable experience for everyone. Provide food and transportation, give out rewards, talk with debaters from other schools.

Once again, I am very thankful to be able to share what it is like being represented as WSDA captain. Before I go, I would like to call upon more talented debaters like y’all to join in more WSDA’s tournaments - both online and offline - to represent your school’s sprit. Your voices are the reasons why we are today. Good luck everyone and thank you so much for listening.

04、坚持不懈的努力和持续不断的支持

学生代表 Amber Yuan的发言中，她对WSDA提供参加很多辩论赛机会表示感谢。她回顾了自己的辩论之路，从 2019 年第一次登台亮相，到成为Golden/IRON Speaker，再到领导学校的辩论社团。

在她的带领下，学校的辩论队取得了很多突破性的成功，不仅提高了排名，还促进了公开演讲和批判性思维能力的成长。Amber说道：“我们都热爱这项活动，并在公开演讲、逻辑推理和批判性思维方面获得了巨大的成长。在这里，我们结识了新朋友，相互学习，经历了成功与失败，建立了团队精神，并通过辩论探讨了政治、经济、法律和军事等各种话题。辩论给我们带来了无数的收获！”

Is everyone ready? My time starts…just kidding. I’m not about to deliver a constructive speech. Hi everyone! I’m Amber from Keystone Academy, and it is my great honor to be here as a student representative. I’m pretty sure that many of you guys are still cutting a card for your case or preparing blocks for your rebuttals, so I won’t bore you for too long.

First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to WSDA for giving me the opportunity to return to the debate stage, as it feels like returning to a familiar home. Over the past five years since day 1, debate has been closely intertwined with my life and has changed me in numerous ways.

I still remember the 7th National Tournament in 2019 when I participated in the original oratory division right after graduating from elementary school. It was my first time stepping onto the stage and being able to express my ideas in a loud and clear manner. Back then, of course I was extremely inexperienced. It was the encouragement and support from the professional judges and coaches that gave me confidence to move forward in the activity. Later on, I continued to participate in numerous online and offline debates, including the 8th and 9th National Tournaments in both public forum and world schools divisions. The results I achieved today would be nothing without consistent efforts and continuous support.

While engaging in speech and debate, I have also had the privilege of becoming a Golden/IRON Speaker. As a WSDA captain of my school, I founded an English debate club where we discuss and practice debate topics for each season outside of school classes. We also participate in tournaments together. In the recent competition, Keystone achieved excellent results in elementary, middle, and high school speech and debate, bring our school's ranking from out of the top 100 to the 27th place now. We have all developed a love for this activity and experienced tremendous growth in public speaking, logical reasoning, and critical thinking. Here, we have made new friends, learned from each other, encountered success and failure, established teamwork, and explored various topics such as politics, economy, law, and military through debate. Debate has brought us countless rewards!

Today, I am sincerely grateful to WSDA for giving me this precious opportunity. As this is my last championship tournament before applying to university, I will actively strive together with the contestants to perform well in this competition. We will adhere to the rules, respect the judges, staff members, and most importantly, collaborate with our teammates and learn from our opponents at the same time.

Lastly, I wish everyone a successful and enjoyable tournament in the next two days. Best of luck and happy new year! Thus, I “affirm the resolution”. Thank you.

巅峰对决 邀你观战

WSDA Winternational Championship