Last January 21, 2009, The UP Manila Debate Circle had its first Debate Education Program. The target audience were public high school students (but we invited private high school students as well). The goal of the program is to introduce the basics of debate and argumentation to (public) high school students.

The Rationale. The UP Manila Debate Circle felt that:

1. …Many high schools students are not aware of the basics of the sport. The organization wants to introduce debating to them so that these kids would be prepared for collegiate debating or at least make them interested in immersing themselves in the scene.
2. …Manila (and/or Public) High Schools is (taken collectively okay?) an unchartered territory in the debate scene map. UPMDC wants to train them to have a bigger pool of rookie collegiate debaters.
3. …It needs to do have Corporate Social Responsibility programs. Save the nation through the oblation! Haha!

The program’s activity head is yours truly. :D And I feel that I will make this my advocacy–Bringing debate to the masses! (Yeah, sounds like tra[ditional]po[litician] but it’s true. Haha.) Debating seems to be stereotyped as a sport for the elite (almost comparable to football’s image perhaps?). But it’s not. Everyone can debate. Everyone debates. :D

I would like to thank the following people who made DEP possible:

1. Ate CiaCia for sparing some of her time for us and for waiting some 30 minutes more before she can finally start her lecture.
2. Kuya James for not caring about his topic (Kahit anong topic, okay lang!) –I changed his topic a couple of times and he was just okay with it. :D
3. Anzen for staying up late last night to make some presentation slides and lecturing about a topic too :) and oh, for demo-debating too!
4. DS for carrying the juice boxes, waiting for the participants at the CAS gate and for Demo-debating.
5. Elmer for accompanying DS wait for participants and socializing with them. Haha.
6. Kuya Lee for not caring much about his recent exam just to go to the program. Haha. And for demo-debating too!
7. Bhea aka crush aka Cassandra aka Dragonessa for dropping by. Haha. And for demo-debating!
8. Leah for taking some video and pictures and for tokenistic-adjudicating-slash-lecturing!
9. Benralph for taking advantage of his DepEd connections to make red-tape a little less red and for assissting Leah for her tokenistic-adjudicating!
10. Keith for dropping by even it is originally impossible to do so and for helping Leah take some video and pictures!
11. Clarissa aka triplet for giving some moral support. Hehe. And for helping us do some post-program tasks!
12. Alvina aka Supreme Overlord for pressuring me to do my tasks so I can meet the deadline. Haha. And for pressuring the CAS dean to have the opening remarks (who eventually didn’t show up!)
13. Kuya Eric for all the moral support :D

I (we) am (are) planning to have a bigger DEP next year, or a Debate Education Camp! The Division of City Schools Manila expressed their interest in tying up with UPMDC for future HS debate activities in Manila!

omina supra ratio. :)

Next week, the UP Manila Debate Circle will celebrate its first ever Debate Week. A celebration wouldn’t be complete without fun activities. I totally encourage you to join all of these events:

A Quiz Bee following the Jeopardy game show format. Everyone in the university is invited to join–the winner takes home Php 2,000.00. Yey!

A seminar for high school students, the Debate Education Program will teach students the basics of argumentation in three hours. It will be held in the RH-303, or the Little Little Theater.

From 9:00 AM – 12:00 NN in the College of Pharmacy Auditorium, the Symposium on Youth and Political Communication will tackle relevant issues, such as the role of youth in the electoral process and the state of student activism.

If you have any questions regarding these events, don’t hesitate to ask me or any member of the organization. Thanks! And, see you there! :)