Learning to deliver their best without being fazed or dazed by opponent’s sparkle
The Sri Lankan debating team reached the octo-finals of the World Schools Debating Championships (WSDC) this year, before having to cede to the eventual grand winner, Canada. This year all our debaters clinched ranks within the Top 50, a noteworthy feat given that 76 teams battled wits, a number of them seasoned debaters.
This year Sri Lanka’s overall rank was 13. Of the five-member team ably moulded by head coach Kithmina Hewage and assistant coach Nimaya Harris, Ashwin Laksumanage was ranked 5th overall (3rd in English as a Second Language), Anah Cassim was 24th overall (8th ESL), Humaid Saleem was 29th overall (11th ESL) and Chanidu Ratnayake 32nd overall (14th ESL) while Reiha Wimalasekere didn’t debate the minimum number of rounds required to be ranked.
The team members: Left to right, Chanidu,Humaid, Ashwin, Reiha and Anah
The training began last November for the team. One of the phrases Kithmina would keep drilling was ‘control the controllable’, says Ashwin, from the Colombo International School. It set the tone to deliver their best without being fazed or dazed by any opponent’s sparkle.
Of the preliminary rounds four were prepared motions while four were impromptu. For the prepared motions two months were allowed and the topics veered towards contemporary issues like the growing Gulf influence in the Horn of Africa.
Anah Cassim of Bishop’s College says that while a virtual tournament did seem to dampen and ‘demoralize’ at first, it also meant that they got to participate in more international tournaments prior to the WSDC, meaning more practice away from familiar home grounds.
Once the tournament dawned it was evident that they were pitted against teams who had put in just as much as intense training and who possessed just as much éclat and talent.
The way Sri Lanka handled their collective performance helped immensely. Says Anah, “I think we were fortunate in that all of us had a good dynamic with each other and we were able to build friendships (that I hope will last a long time). …those contributed to how we functioned as one team and unit regardless who was speaking at a particular round.”
For all five members the learning curve was steep indeed. Ashwin says he mastered a lot of calmness, while all of it was ‘immense fun’ amidst the challenge posed by excellent teams like Canada, Singapore, Pakistan and the Philippines.
Anah adds that for most of them the pivotal lesson was that “there isn’t really isn’t an upper limit to how much you can improve as a debater.”
She adds, “I thought that getting in to the national team was where the hard part ended- but it was where it began. I think the more we went up against good teams that had performed well historically at international tournaments, the more it was an opportunity for us to test how much we could improve as well… and there was potential for good speeches to become better speeches- and every time we performed well it was a validation the training was working.”
“That was the motivation that propelled us forward,” she says “recognizing we had so much to give than we thought we had, and that was the most important part of training.”
This is the second time the Sri Lankan team had reached the octo-finals of the most prestigious tournament in schools debating. Last year’s debaters were runners-up losing to Canada in the finals.