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John Brennan

Inclusiveness is an underlying principle of the debating programme at Diocesan Girls’ School (DGS), and this policy has been a spur to competitive success.
In April, the DGS team won the Hong Kong Schools Debating Competition 2017 Senior Division - for Years 10 to 13 - overcoming Island School in the finals. The team was made up of four S4 debaters: Vennese Chan, Jessie Lo, Jocelyn Tsang and Chloe Yeung.
DGS English teacher Joan Cho has been in charge of the school’s English debate team since 2013.
“Our school currently has more than 70 people in the English debate team, with even more in the debate club,” Cho said. “Although we are a large programme, we want all 70 of our girls to feel they can contribute to the debate community at large.”
Unfortunately, not all of the school’s debaters are able to experience inter-school competition. However, DGS runs junior and senior training sessions every Friday to give everyone the opportunity to take part in shadow debates and help the competing teams with their preparation.

DGS was the winner of the Hong Kong Schools Debating Competition 2017 for the Senior Division.
For Cho, solid preparation is the most important aspect of success in competition. “Sometimes, 12 hours before the match, you see the students editing team arguments and uploading large swathes of their cases on their Google documents.”
The motions the teams have to debate in inter-school contests don’t shy away from contentious topics. At the Hong Kong Schools Debating Competition, the proposal the DGS team had to oppose was “This house endorses the use of virtual reality to fulfil socially taboo fantasies”.
“We argued that for potential paedophiles, satisfying their fantasies with virtual reality would only exacerbate their indulgence in the fantasy, normalising it in their minds and thus, reinforcing their need to indulge,” explained DGS team member Tsang. “We also argued that it might give rise to a VR industry featuring socially tabooed fantasies, which would further promote these crooked values and legitimise this as a proper industry in society.”
Lo admitted that Island School’s counter-argument that consideration had to be given to the mentally ill who needed VR to keep their hallucinations under control had caught her and her teammates momentarily offguard.
“This debate wasn’t about the mentally ill at all, and we didn’t expect this argument to pop up,” she said. “However, we did respond by saying that the mentally ill were outside the scope of the discussion, and this debate should be about the majority of the population who are mentally stable and healthy.”
While Cho considers success in the big inter-school contests to be a great motivator, she also believes the junior debaters learn even more by observing how the seniors behave in competitions.
“For junior tournaments, our seniors not only coach but also serve as judges,” Cho said. “We also sometimes send swing teams to tournaments whenever needed.”
In the coming school year, Chan, Lo, Tsang and Yeung will be moving into leadership roles in the team, organising and training the DGS juniors.
“The team as a whole will continue to take part in the competitions we have contested this year and, hopefully, our juniors can sustain the good work of their seniors,” said Cho.
But, in her view, there is much more to be gained from participating in debates than just trophies.
“We believe that the three skills needed to prep for a debate - motion analysis, research and delivery - will be invaluable for students in the future,” Cho said. “They will learn to think about a topic from the point of view of all stakeholders, learn about critical topics like the Syrian refugee crisis or reclaiming brownfield land in Hong Kong, then speak about these issues in a persuasive manner.”
Related read: Multi-lingual discourse
Related read: The value of a good argument
Related read: Hard work pays off
Related read: The power of persuasion


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[School Debate Series] Diocesan Girls’ School: A convincing case

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Inclusiveness is an underlying principle of the debating programme at Diocesan Girls’ School (DGS), and this policy has been a spur to competitive success.


[School Debate Series] Diocesan Girls’ School: A convincing case

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Inclusiveness is an underlying principle of the debating programme at Diocesan Girls’ School (DGS), and this policy has been a spur to competitive success.

Inclusiveness is an underlying principle of the debating programme at Diocesan Girls’ School (DGS), and this policy has been a spur to competitive success.