UST Business Students Win Joint University Debate

Abstract

[evdate 2004-03-28]

PRESS RELEASE

2 April 2004

UST Business Students Win Joint University Debate

2 April 2004 A team of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) undergraduate business students emerged as champions at the Joint University Debate Competition (JUDC) held on March 28, 2004. The success followed on the heels of the winning of a major international case competition held from March 23-27, in Canada by another group of undergraduate business students from HKUST.

This year's JUDC consisted of multiple preliminary rounds held throughout the year where each team competed against all the others one by one. UST made it to the final round with the highest numbers of wins.

Held on March 28 on the campus of the Hong Kong University (HKU), the motion of the final was "We should ban all nuclear weapons" with UST arguing for the motion and HKU against. The four members of the UST team, Jayesh Peswani, Diana Poon, Loretta Tsui and Anit Thakral, impressed the judges with their English delivery skills and calm demeanor in which they argued their points. UST won the first prize and Anit Thakral was awarded Best Debater.

"After hearing UST announced as winners, I was exhilarated, and ironically - speechless. This semester a lot of our more experienced debaters were on exchange. So we had the added challenge of making up for their absence. But at the end of the day, the team"s hard work paid off as we got to enjoy the feeling you can only get, when you know you have made it," said Anit Thakral.

"Researching for the debate was a challenge for us. We had to learn about the mechanisms of how a nuclear weapon works, and about international relations. We had so much information which we had to compress into a clear and concise caseline. And it felt great to win," said Diana Poon.

Professor Kar Yan Tam, Associate Dean and Director of Undergraduate Programs, said: "We are very pleased that our students came out with flying colors in competitions where they were pitted against the brightest students from other schools both locally and overseas. The wins speak volumes of the high quality of our students. We are very proud of them."

This year seven local universities participated in JUDC.

- Baptist University - Chinese University - City University - Hong Kong University - Hong Kong University of Science and Technology - Lingnan University - Polytechnic University

Group photo: