Four Olympia outstanding students excelled in qualifying for the Asian online debating championship 2021

Brave, confident and fully equipped with knowledge was what we can talk about the 4 girls: Phuong Thuy, Thuy Chi, Linh Khanh and Thai An showed in the Asian Online Debating Championship 2021. With this tournament, they have brought the impressive “first-times” to the debating achievement record of the Olympia Schools.

Since the pandemic of Covid-19 is still taking place in a plethora of countries, causing numerous debating contests and tournaments unable to be directly held, the online forms of debate have been conducted with the guaranteed quality and immense scale when participants are lessened the burden of transportation and fees. One of the prominent debating contests which is held in the early 2021 under the name of Asian Online Debating Championship 2021 has attracted students all over Asia’s attention, including pupils of Olympia.

Four team members of the Olympia A at Asian Online Debating Championship 2021

As an esteemed international contest, Asian Online Debating Championship 2021 brings upon a debating playground for every experienced debaters all over Asia to attend. With the participation of debaters from strong countries such as Malaysia, India, Korea and Japan. The championship truly is a place to aid secondary school and high school students to improve their knowledge, gain practical experience, get used to diverse forms of international debate as well as creating opportunities to prove Vietnamese debaters’ capability on the international arena.

Remaining the tradition of being strong at debate not only in Hanoi but also in the entire Vietnam, this time, D-DOXA club of Olympia introducing youthful teams which are lack of experience comparing to the previous generation as a result of a year suffering from Covid-19 with a few tournament was organized. However, achievements of teams from Olympia institute weren't affected by that at all. On the contrary, Asian Online Debating Championship 2021 has taken place successfully according to the goal that was made by team Olympia A with 4 members that are Phuong Thuy, Thuy Chi, Linh Khanh (grade 11) and Thai An (grade 10). Most contestants of the team have been taking part in debate for 1-2 years but their performance has exceeded all the expectations.

Thai An is an excellent student who has won the best speech in expansion board

With this championship, Olympia A has successfully passed the elimination round, won the 12th place out of 44 participating teams and it’s even more honorable since member Phan Le Thai An belongs to the top 5 of the best speakers of the extension chart. This achievement is extremely special due to the fact that this was the first time members of D-DOXA passed the elimination round of an international championship.

Speaking of the acquired achievement, Thai An said:

“Firstly, I feel tremendously surprised in light of the fact that this is the most excellent personal achievement I have ever had in debate. I'm also pretty proud of my recognized effort. I think the most crucial factor that leads to this achievement is teamwork. Throughout the debates, my teammates always support and cheer me on. I am supremely grateful for my team.”

With enormous achievement records at national and international debating contests, members of D-DOXA club understand that effort is success to debaters. Moreover, there is another essential factor, which was mentioned by Thuy Chi, is teamwork.

“I think what makes D-DOXA more successful than other debating clubs is the cooperation among teammates in both competitive spirit as well as the process of establishing a complete case with the harmonious cooperation among the 3 speeches. Thanks to the unity argumentation system and the “later speaker must support the previous speaker” spirit, D-DOXA teams could gain scores.”

A lesson of debating in D-DOXA club

Despite having a successful championship, the 4 representatives of Olympia A still believe that there are a lot that can be changed in order to improve next time performances.

“In a debating contest, we are always determined to put in our entire effort so that we would not have any regrets after the tournament. However, there are several aspects we wish to achieve in the upcoming tournament, which is the Hanoi Debate Tournament (HDT). Since AODC was organized virtually but HDT will be held offline, hopefully we will have the chance to actually compete against students all around Hanoi and make new friends so as to learn from one another.”

Asian Online Debating Championship 2021 was only a mere stop on the debating path of the 4 girls. To them, debate brings more than merely an award or achievement in a competition. Speaking of the reason for choosing debate, the 4 girls have the same perspective about this fascinating subject.

“Debate helps people perceive a topic multidimensionally, and teaches us to be forgiving to others. We believe that what youngsters can learn from debate are not only public speaking, confidence and reasoning skills. Behind the scenes of the intense debate, students can learn about globalizing knowledge, extraordinary perspectives that go beyond the classroom and perspectives that are opposite to their prejudice. From then on, after each and every debate, no matter winning or losing, what is left are the understandings, sympathies, and profound viewpoints of a topic.”

Coming to debate, students also get to know a vast, open, adorable and erudite society consisting of national and international debaters. Prior to the pandemic, D-DOXA has supported pupils travelling both nationally and internationally. We hope that students will be able to have those practical experiences with debate once again in the near future.

In the upcoming Hanoi Debate Tournament, Olympia school and D-DOXA club will take the members to the contest as participants and judges. The Hanoi Debate Tournament is also a big national championship that captivates numerous debaters from excellent teams around the country.

“In the distant future, generations of high school students are continuously training the future generation of D-DOXA so that they will be able to compete on international level, participate in tournaments such as Oldham, AODC… and has the opportunity to compete against debaters who are on top of the world. We truly hope to have the school as well as parental support so the upcoming generation can also shine.”