DEbate – have a debate in English, this year, too!

This is the fifth time the Institute of British and American Studies has advertised the English language debate competition for secondary school students, this time in cooperation with the U.S. Embassy in Hungary. The topic of the debate this year will be the 1989 change in the political and economi

The organisers await the application of groups of three from secondary schools from any year. Applications can be submitted until September 20, 2019 by completing the page debate.unideb.hu and by submitting the preselection assignment, a creative project about the cultural memory of the events of 1989 to the email address debatedebrecen@gmail.com.

- Following applications, the semi-finals will be staged in the American Corners of Debrecen, Pécs, Szeged and Veszprém with the participation of 24 teams, while the final, in contrast with the Debrecen venues so far, will take place in Budapest in December with the ten best teams, Balázs Venkovits, associate professor of the Department of American Studies and Director of the Institute of British and American Studies told hirek.unideb.hu. The programme’s main organiser stressed: there is a reason for the topic choice as the year 2019 is the 30th annyiversary of the change in the political and economic regime. At the same time the debate competition can also offer a good opportunity for seconday school students to familiarise themselves with the events of the period 30 years back thoroughly enough for them to be able to carry out debates about them, in English at that. This will be a complex test, Balázs venkovits added.