In a new wrinkle to our 2017 debate topic, the NFL may start to fine players who refuse to stand for the national anthem.
Posters Posters Posters
Here are posters for the upcoming middle and high school debate championships.
By in Announcements
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Middle School Match-ups
Competing in the Middle School Championships this year on May 30 will be: The 226 Debate Crew vs 352X BxDebatesAllDay. Congratulations to both teams for advancing to the finals!
Competing in the 3rd Pl/ Honorable Mention debate on June 4 will be the 25R Panthers vs the 169M Rising Stars. We can’t wait to see how it plays out.
Battle of the Boroughs
The High School Finals are set! Debating in the Championship match this year will be The 721M Cityhawks Revolutionaries (undefeated) against The 751 MSCD Eagles. This will be a battle of Manhattan for the title!
Debating for the 3rd Place and Honorable Mention awards this year will be The 373K Fire Debaters versus 368K Brooklyn’s Finest Debate Team, a battle of Brooklyn. Congratulations to all four teams (and the boroughs of Brooklyn and Manhattan) for an incredible regular season and playoffs, and good luck in your final debate!
High School Playofs
We almost forgot to publicly congratulate all of the High School teams that made it to this year’s playoffs! They are:
The 721M Cityhawks Revolutionaries
368K Brooklyn’s Finest Debate Team
The 373K Fire Debaters
The 993Q Rat Pack
The 751M MSCD Eagles
Championship Topic Announced
The topic for this year’s Championship Debates is: The Second Amendment Should be Repealed.
The top two teams in each bracket (winners of the playoff matches) will debate this topic on May 30 and 31 at 751M. The teams that do not do not go on to the finals will debate online on June 4 and 5 for 3rd Place and Honorable Mention titles.
Let the research begin!
Middle School Playoffs
Congratulations to this year’s Middle School Final Four teams! They are:
The 25R Panthers
The 169M Rising Scholars
The 226M Debate Crew
352X Bx Debates All Day
Stay tuned for the High School announcement and team match-ups, coming soon.
Who Calls the Coin Toss?
Round 3 is well underway this week with teams presenting convincing arguments on both sides of the single use plastics debate. One question that has come up is how the moderator determines which team was “logged in first” to call the coin toss. For the record, when the moderator signs on at 9am, they will prompt you to start the tech check. The first team to activate their video feed for the tech check gets to call the coin toss (heads or tails). The winner of the toss then gets to decide which side they choose for the debate- Pro or Con.
Plastic Roads?
Here is an interesting video from the BBC about a start-up company that is using plastic to make roads: Can plastic roads help save the planet?
Private Prisons, Revisited
Our 2015 final debate topic was “Should private prisons be legal?” The New York Times published an article describing some of the serious issues related to a private prison in Mississippi.
World’s First Plastic-free Supermarket Aisle
Can one aisle lead to a more sustainable future? Check out this video from CNN to learn more.
What are Bioplastics?
This short video from PBS Nova explains:
Great Pacific Garbage Patch in the News
The “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” is one place where a lot of discarded plastic ends up. A study published Thursday in the journal Scientific Reports discovered that the “patch” is actually much larger than scientists had thought. So what does this have to do with single use plastic and our latest debate topic? This article from The New York Times adds some information for both sides of the debate.
https://nyti.ms/2G1awRj
Woman Killed by Driverless Car
Tragedy struck when a woman was killed by a driverless car. The car was an Uber taxicab, and there was a person in the car (though not driving at the time).
Uber plans to suspend its driverless car project for the time being.
Virtual Currency, Revisited
Back in 2014, our debate topic was “In the future, all currency should be virtual.” Well, Israel took a step in that direction, when it passed a law to limit cash transactions between people and stores. They did it to stop different kinds of economic crimes, as well as to make sure the goverment collects all of the taxes to which they are entitled.
At the same time, bankers around the world met to discuss whether the countries’ central banks (the main governemnt banks) should issue virtual currency at all. They were afraid it could ruin economies and contribute to financing terrorism.
Round 3 Topic Announced
The Round 3 topic and match-ups have been announced. The topic is: Single use plastic should be banned.
Debaters, start your engines…
Moving on…
Welcome back from the break! We didn’t post much during Round 2, but there were some awesome debates that took place, including a few double headers. The topic and schedule for Round 3 will be announced this week, so if you have any last minute suggestions for what you would like to debate, please speak up!
Debaters, Start Your Engines!
This morning is the start of Round 2. Here is the opening slide:
By in Announcements, Topical
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What About Self-driving Trucks?
As we delve deeper into the topic of automated (aka self-driving) cars, we keep running into questions about self-driving trucks. Would the same rules apply? Do we need different laws for trucks than for cars? Which should come first? What about all the trucking jobs? We are curious to hear what the teams found out in their research. Round 2 begins next week. Are you ready?!
Getting Ready for Round 2
D75 Debate got the chance to visit the 226M Debate Team on Tuesday as they were preparing arguments for their upcoming debate on driverless cars. They had so many interesting ideas about the topic, and even a few jokes. We had a great time!
Tune in on Feb 15 to check out their match against the Great Debaters from 140K.