Kurdistan Universities Academic Debate Competition
“Education is not about learning facts; education is about learning how to think!” Einstein.
Definition: this activity is a competition project amongst the students of sixteen universities aimed to boost up their competitive skills of communication, thinking, argumentation and criticality in an academic methodology. Also, it is targeted to broaden and fasten the relations between the students of different universities in Kurdistan Region, hoping for building a bridge of mutual understanding and incorporation.
Place: Tishk International University in Erbil, specifically its Faculty of Education, with open arms intends to show the hospitality of providing the location of the competition, the big hall of conferences, No. 302 in floor 3 is recommended to be the headquarter of the project. On regular basis, and as further assistance, the College of Basic Education in the University of Salahaddin by providing Pari Hall has a positive intention to overwhelm the location of the project.
Management Staff: The management and supervision of the mission will be done voluntarily. A team of volunteer teachers in all the 16 universities, at least one to represent each university, will be established in order to arrange, plan and run the debates in an organized method. The members of this committee are in the teaching staff of their own universities, who have prominent skills and capabilities of evaluating and marking on the students proficiencies in terms of language fluency, criticality, thinking, confidence and manners. The management staff will enhance both mediating and assessing the debates. As they zestful, experienced and qualified teachers, they are planned and meant to be unbiased, objective and professional.
The Committee of Management and Evaluation:
In order to run the whole mission, a representative in each university is nominated to be a member of the Committee. This team behaves in an objective and unbiased method and will be a mediator between all the universities, and it is responsible for 4 main tasks:
- Evaluate and put grades for each team in the sessions.
- Decide which team is eligible to win or leave the project.
- Run the project technically.
- Design the format of the debate, the topics, and the logistic details.
How would the Committee of Management and Evaluation decide which team is the winner?
Meanwhile a debate session is processed; the Committee decides to put six members of the Committee as the staff of the Jury to assess the session and decide which team is eligible to win or leave the project. This evaluation process will be based on a rubric cliché that has various criteria based on smartness, confidence, language skills, thought and critical thinking. The jury staff is composed of university lecturers as well as professional academicians who work for institutions and training centers. In order to keep the objectivity of the process, these members of the Jury in such sessions should NOT belong to any participant university of the session itself. They should belong to the other universities of the Committee.
Time: the consuming time of the whole project will be one month (or may be more) on a regular stage-by-stage basis. On each Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, the debates will be run. For each debate one hour is expected to be needed. The large domain of the debate participants will be narrowed down to smaller step by step. The 1st session of the debate may start on 29th of January 2019, and it may finish on 19th of February 2019. The universities’ groups are planned to be chosen to match each other randomly on the basis of a lottery in the very beginning. This is to make sure that the process is intended to be run fairly and equally. It needs 7 sessions to terminate.
Time of the debates:
Every Tuesdays and Wednesdays the debates may start at 3;00- to 4:00.
Note: It is suggested that the hosted universities may bring their own fans from the students as audience to view the debate sessions meantime their universities are participating in the project. The security allowance, with detailed checklists, in the university gate is kindly requested.
This is the map of the debate sessions:
Round 1 Session 1 (29/1/2019)
Session 2 (30/1/2019)
Session 3 (5/2/2019)
Session 4 (6/2/2019)
Round 2 Session 5 (12/2/2019)
Session 6 (13/2/2019)
Round 3: Session 7 (9/2/2019) THE FINAL
Note: If due to the students’ examinations, the time needs to be extended, it may be taken into consideration by the taking care of the limited time-zone.
This timetable is highly expected to be changed!
Students’ Staff: The participants will be the students of the different departments of their representative universities. They will be voluntarily and spontaneously registered by their universities, and each university has its policy and method for the way the debaters are elected. The committee doesn’t directly encompass the internal mechanism within one university itself. However, the committee has to make sure that all the participants should be eligible and capable for the mission. Also, some students may voluntarily get engaged in the mediating mission of the debates. For each university, it is allowed to bring 4 participators. In each case one participator withdraws its role in the next phase; he/she will be substituted by a new one that his/her university will nominate. In time the Committee wants to talk to any university, it will directly involve to talk to the volunteer teacher of the University for fixing any issue. Of course the departments and colleges of the participant teachers and students have to be aware of their participation.
Awards: The winner students are recommended to be awarded at least by certificates of participation.
Topics: The topics of these talks and debates are carefully chosen by the Committee of Management and Supervision on the basis of the levels and needs of the students in terms of scientific, educational and cultural engagements of the students with their own personal and social life, as well as the problems and concerns of our Kurdish society.
The following list includes some examples:
- Technology between the bright and dark effects on our community.
- Smartness is based on gender diversity (men and women).
- The best place for women to work is home.
- Social media has made us unsocial.
- The new generation is smarter than the classic generation.
- Creative people are born or made?
- The language of the universities should be international.
- The assessment of the students should be based on projects not examinations.
- University dressing should be uniform.
- Environment pollution is due to people’s lack of awareness.
Etc…..
Cost and Budget:
Tishk International University takes charge of the whole cost.
Format of the Debates:
The Committee of the management and supervision will conduct a suitable format and method for the debates in the very beginnings by negotiations and discussions. However, the following format as seen to be suitable is recommended:
The Mediator’s Opining Speech
The Proposer’s 1st speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Objector’s 1st speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Proposer’s 2nd speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Objector’s 2nd speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Proposer’s 3rd speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Objector’s 3rd speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Proposer’s 4th speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
The Objector’s 4th speaker’s speech: 5 minutes
Teams’ Question-Answer Time 6 minutes
Audience Question-Answer Time 6 minutes
Open- Discussion Time 18 minutes
The closed-discussion of the Evaluation Committee 2 minutes
The Announcement of the winner team
Bukhari Abdulla
A .Lecturer in Salahaddin University & Tishk International University
Initiator and Manager of the project
