Debating

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Debating News & Results | Debating at the Union | What Is Debating? | How to Join Debating | Competition Guide | The Cambridge IV 2010 | Schools Competition | Debating Terms | Debating Committee |

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The Cambridge Union Society
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Cambridge Union Society Competititve Debating is kindly sponsored by Citi. Thanks, Citi!The Cambridge Union is the globally renowned debating society of Cambridge. Debating at the Union offers you the chance to improve your public speaking skills, represent Cambridge at national and international competitions and become part of a global debating community. You do not need any previous debating experience to join us and so, if you are interested, why not have a go?

For find out more about Cambridge debating, look at the pages in this section, which you can find at the top or under the 'Where you are' section on the left hand side. You can email the Debating Officers, Harish Natarajan and Jack Watson: debating@cus.org.

We are very kindly sponsored by Citi.


Cambridge are the 2009-2010 English debating champions!

Doug Cochran and Uven Chong won this year's ESU Mace, the English debating championships. In a competition involving over 60 teams from across England, Doug and Uven won the final, debating whether or not citizen initiated referenda for elections should be introduced. Uven, a PhD student studying Engineering said "I am very happy that we were able to win the English Mace for the Cambridge Union. This win is a result of the support of all the wonderful debaters and coaches at the Union, who make debating such a pleasure." They now go on to represent England at the International Mace at Cardiff in April.


Outreach Projects

The Cambridge Union runs many outreach projects, teaching children to start debating and to express their ideas. One such project involved Year 6 students from schools in Tower Hamlets, who came to visit the Union in February 2010. You can view some of that project in the video opposite.

Along with this project, we also run free debating workshops across the country that last year reached over 1000 school students.


RGS Newcastle

Schools Competition 2010

Congratulations to all the schools who participated in this year's Cambridge Schools Debating competition. This year's competition involved over 750 school teams, which made it one of the largest schools debating competitions in the world.

Special congratulations goes to RGS Newcastle, who were this year's champions and all the teams who attended our Finals Day.

Our thanks go to our convenor team of Sam Dobin, Faye Cheung and Charlotte Thomas, the adjudication team of Doug Cochran, Ashleigh Lamming and David Middlemiss, the regional convenors and organisers and everyone who helped out by judging or organising the competition.


Joining Cambridge Debating

You can join Cambridge Debating for free if you are a Union member. We offer free workshops, opportunities to debate for Cambridge at domestic and international competitions and chances to meet new people from Cambridge, the UK and the world.

You don't need any previous debating experience and the majority of our debaters learnt their skills through our workshop program.

If you're interested in joining, have a look at the 'How to Join Cambridge Debating' section, where you can find instructions to join our mailing list or the Cambridge Union Competitive Debating Facebook group.

Debating Recruitment