Singapore Worlds 2004

[John Stewart]

Just to let you all know we are expecting to send 2 teams to the Worlds Debating Championships hosted by Nanyang Technical University Singapore from 27th December to 3rd January 2004.

Last year's teams put in a good shift, and we will be looking for 4 speakers to follow in their footsteps next year.

Competitiors will be expected to contribute towards the cost of their own travel - about £700 at present - and attend both training sessions and IVs over the first term next year. They will also be expected to assist in training new speakers over the full year, and utilise their newfound experience for the good of the society (i.e. this is not a junket - we will expect you to continue to compete for the University over the remainder of the year).

Although we will be fundraising to help meet the cost of travelling to Singapore, you should be prepared to meet the whole cost yourself if needed.

For more information, or to express an interest in applying, please e-mail me at js67.

The deadline for applications will be 12pm midnight on Sunday 25th May.

[Kizzy]

What about accommodation? Do we have to pay for that as well? If so, how much (roughly)?

[Cain]

[s]Kizzy wrote on 13:43, 8th May 2003:
What about accommodation? Do we have to pay for that as well? If so, how much (roughly)?


that's right. the accomodation will be rough. bring plenty of blankets

[John Stewart]

Actually, Cain, for your reference, accommodation is in 4-star hotels, and is provided as part of the entrance fee.

You may however have to pay for accommodation and food for the few days either side of the tournament that we will be in Singapore. And we won't know how many days that is until we've gone and booked flights.

I'm looking at the moment about flying out on 24/25 December and flying back on 7/8 January. It's about the cheapest times to fly, and also allows us a little time for sightseeing and shopping.

To check out the tournament details, go to http://www.ntu.edu.sg/worlds/
to see what it's all about.

[John Stewart]

I've finally got around to writing the application form. Everyone who has so far indicated any interest in selection should have been e-mailed a copy.

Anyone else interested, please e-mail me ASAP at js67@st-and...

[John Stewart]

It's taken me a while to get this far, something to do with having to unload lorry-loads of parcels during the day to make money to pay for my "debating" trips over the next year...

Given that Webmail is down at the moment, I'll announce it here.

Following the meeting of the selection panel last week, it was decided that we will be represented in Singapore by the following:

St Andrews A (Tony Dunn & Matt Dyson)
Judge - John Stewart

However, selection of the B team is a bit controversial. If a B team is to be sent, then I will announce that selection on here in due course. For the moment, only the above are selected, and are to be wished all the best for a successful Worlds campaign.

[Eliot Wilson]

I now understand that the Board, in its infinite wisdom, has decided to instruct the Inter-'Varsity Secretary and the Worlds selection panel to choose a second team, which it had previously declined to do.

What fun.

[Eliot Wilson]

By the way, John, are you able to check your e-mails at the moment?

[John Stewart]

Now that it appears that Webmail actually WORKS again, yes, Eliot, I can.

I'm hoping to announce the selection of the second team by the end of the week. Only those who have applied already will be considered. I don't anticipate it to be an easy decision. Hence why the selection panel decided not to decide.

[Barry Joss]

That is, frankly, outrageous. But it comes as no surprise. I well remember sitting on a judging panel some years ago for Worlds' selection and we were unanimous in our belief that only one team was even adequate - let alone a realistic winner. Sadly, we were obliged to select a secont team then as well. As predicted, we got nowhere and wasted money and damaged the University's standing by using the World Championship, effectively, as practice. If there are no teams that are good enough - no teams should be sent. Wanting to go with your mates, being pissed off because you all entered and nobody (or fewer than anticipated) got sent are, frankly, not important enough reasons. For the Board to have asked senior and experienced members to judge only to over-rule their decision is scandalously high-handed and precisely the sort of thing the SSC should decline to fund and/or should take action over. I am disappointed in you all. For shame.

[Eliot Wilson]

Just so that everyone understands what is going on, I thought that, as chairman of the selection panel for Worlds, I should explain what we decided.

The panel received a number of applications from our most prominent debaters (no sniggering at the back, there). We decided relatively quickly that Messrs. Dyson and Dunn were our most promising team and the pair most likely to achieve some success. I wish them all the luck in the world and hope that they will do well.

We also decided relatively quickly - and the Inter-'Varsity Secretary quite properly excluded himself for this part of the process - that Mr. Stewart was more than qualified to represent St. Andrews as a judge; this was also what he wanted to do at worlds.

We then came to the thornier issue of 'St. Andrews B'. We had several applicants to consider, but after some discussion of possible combinations, we came to the conclusion that there was no combination of the available applicants which offered a significant chance of success on the world stage. I stress the word 'combination'; this is no slight on the individual prowess of the applicants, but debating is a team activity, and we could not envisage a combination which would do well. Given that the entry fee for a team at Worlds is in the region of £500, the selection panel therefore decided not to select a second team and to suggest that the money be spent more profitably elsewhere. We did not think it was right or appropriate to send a team to Worlds with little or no prospect of success simply because the opportunity was there. It would be a waste of the Association's money, and of the WUDC's time. Worlds is not the place for making up the numbers.

That, therefore, was the decision of the selection panel. The Board, however, viewed things rather differently, and voted, narrowly I believe, to send a second team, our advice notwithstanding.

Everyone got all of that? Jolly good.

[Barry Joss]

Then I stand by my remarks. Outrageous. And unconscionable, too.

[Darshybaby]

Hey Eliot and Barry - i totally agree with what you are saying and yes it does not make sense just to send two random partners to Worlds.

However, as Treasurer, i have other concerns. You see, the reason i voted yes, was not because of whatever personal issues are clearly present within the board but because of common sense. Let me just explain how i am thinking here.

As i said, i do agree that it is not worth sending a random team that is not going to be successful.However, i have three points hehe.

Firstly, the union gives us a £1000 and that is only supposed to be spent on Worlds and nothing else. That is clear. So, if we did take the money, we could not actually use the £500 saved, anywhere else. We would get into serious trouble if we did. so, there is no benefit in not sending a second team. This is what you guys have failed to see or maybe you already know a way round it (if so, can somebody tell me -i do respect your guys experience)

Make sense so far? Hope so.

Secondly, this is a dangerous thing to do. You see, if we only send one team -it kinda shows the union, that we do not need to send two teams. So, in the future, during their summer budgeting, they will just think - well lets save £500 and tell Debates to fund their own extra entrants, if they so wish to send more teams. Barry you say that this has been done before - where we have only sent one team? Well, if this keeps happening then, it seriously could make the union want to give us less next year.

Thirdly, this looks bad to our sponsors. I mean if a Society as old as ours cannot even pick a second team, then it absolutely makes us look shit, to put it mildly. This is something we cannot afford to do. Of course, (in true aggressive Cambridge style debating) you might argue, that sending a second team which does really badly, might come across worse than not sending one at all. Well, ok this could be the case too - but as Treasurer, i would rather let the illusion ride that we are better than we are. If our A team do really well, then we can just cover up how badly our B team did - but at least we sent them. Plus the only way to learn is to be there.

To be honest, i think the applications should be reopened - clearly, John cannot find a suitable pairing and this can only be solved by reopening. We might have new freshers, who are really good - have real good experience. Or simply people, who because of exams or other reasons, did not apply. It seems such a stupid idea to say that, the second pairing shall now be picked from a pool of candidates that clearly do not work well together. Does this make sense?

I hope this sort of justifies my decision. I totally see your point of view guys but i thought, that this is going to be damaging to Board harmony, if i did not at least explain my vote.

PLease let me know, what you think. Remember, i had no intention of insulting the panel but my decision was well thought out.

Keep the peace,

darshan

[Eliot Wilson]

Well, so much to say.

It is by no means the case that we always send two teams to Worlds. When I was Inter-'Varsity Secretary, I declined to send a team at all, as we had no one of world calibre at that stage. In 1999/2000 and 2000/2001 we sent only one team each year; James Arnold and Ria Holzerlandt to Sydney and Naomi Loewith and Amy Galigan to Glasgow. I understand your concern about the Association taking away the extra £500, but I would have thought they'd look rather more fondly on us in the future if we explained that, in this particular year, we had no worthwhile second team and therefore didn't want to waste their money for the sake of spending it, but that we might apply for money for two teams for Zagreb in 2004/2005. I should think Campbell Boyle would be a bit annoyed if he thought we were blowing £500 of the Association's money on a junket for a team in whom we had no faith or confidence.

There is, if you will forgive my saying so, a tendency for some of the younger members of the Society to generalise from the specific; they sometimes assume that the Society has always been the way they've seen it over the last couple of years. Hence assumptions like St. Andrews has always been shit at IVs - it hasn't - or that we always send two teams to Worlds - we don't.

I also must differ from the Treasurer in his belief that we 'look bad' if we only send one team. We are a small Society and a small university; I think to find two genuinely world-class debaters in a university of 6,000 isn't at all bad. Better that one team does well than their achievements are overshadowed by a poorly performing second team.

Of course, the decision is out of my hands; I was only the chairman of the selection panel (!). The Board has a right to do what it likes, though it must expect to have to defend its decisions, both to ordinary members of the Society and to the Association. I assume it is prepared to do both, as the Treasurer, to his credit, appears to be.

[Barry Joss]

I think Mr Wilson covered much of my response, so I'll try to keep this brief. Speaking as the Debates Treasurer who managed to bleed in excess of £1,800 out of the Association in 1996 to send a team with a real chance to the Worlds and, further, speaking as the Association Treasurer who set up the current £1,000 per annum deal I think I know a little about how the whole thing is paid for.
It is, and has long been, the Association's poistion that they will Cover the cost of sending one team up to the value of £1,000. In years where transport and so forth is cheap (e.g. Glasgow) the Debating Society is meant to spend less and put money aside for future years where costs will be higher (e.g. Stellenbosch). The Association is NOT the enemy, it is NOT the job of the Deabtes Treasurer to blow all the budget in the hope of proving the need for it and getting more. It is the job of the Treasurer to budget for what he or she believes will be needed, and is subsequently the job of the Convenor as well to lobby the Association for that sum. Some years we need more, some years less. Ultimately it averages out.
So, in conclusion - financially it is irresponsible to spend more money than need be spent and that added to all that I have said above makes me return to my thesis that this is a scandalous decision.

All clear? Any questions, I'm happy to answer.

[Eliot Wilson]

Your point, Mr. Joss (Freudian slip: I typed 'pint' first time), is well made but not always acknowledged. The Association is not the enemy of the Debating Society, or perhaps I should say NEED not be the enemy of the Debating Society. Some figures in the Association - and here I would single out Rory O'Hare and, further back in the mists of time, Steve Durrant - have been extremely supportive of the Debating Society. However, if a Convener or a Board approaches the Association with a them-and-us mentality, it is likely to be mutual.

Moreover, the Board ought to remember that it is a sub-committee of the SSC, and therefore ought to be mindful of the well-being of the Association as a whole.

[Cain]

[s]Darshybaby wrote on 16:01, 10th Jun 2003:
To be honest, i think the applications should be reopened - clearly, John cannot find a suitable pairing and this can only be solved by reopening.

but, if the world class second team aren't there, how will looking harder be any help?

[Eliot Wilson]

Darshan, in a sense, has a point; we didn't say that a world-class team wasn't there, just that it wasn't among the existing applicants. It's possible - though, in my view, unlikely - that such a team exists among students who didn't apply.

[Barry Joss]

That's a dangerous assumption, Mr Wilson. You may well be right, but I can I simply say two words tro you which I hope will demonstrate that some of the finest debaters in the world would rather gnaw off their own limbs than be associated with our society? Ready? Colin Spurway.

[Eliot Wilson]

You know, I knew you were going to say 'Colin Spurway' at some point. Next you'll be saying 'Sefton Darby' to me.