Randfontein High School (RHS) hosted the South African Council for English Education (SACEE) senior debates on 1 March.
Thirty schools participated in the opening three rounds of this year’s competition for pupils from grade 10 to grade 12.
Randfontein High School entered both their A and B teams and although the debate motions were challenging, they once again won their rounds.
The first prepared debate was on banning the use of weaponised drones in warfare.
For this round RHS defeated the teams from African Leadership Academy and Beaulieu College.
The second round was an unprepared debate where pupils had one hour to construct their arguments on giving criminals convicted of petty crimes the choice to accept National Service or jail time as a sentence.
The RHS B team defeated Heronbridge College.
During the third round of the unprepared debates on different promotion criteria for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, RHS was drawn against last year’s top performing schools, Redhill College and Brescia House.
This round was a closed round and results were withheld until the next leg of the competition.
The debaters felt that they did well as they opposed the argument by stating that just because you pay a school fee of R14 000 per month, does not mean that you automatically do well.
Tshepo Mofokeng who is the third speaker for the B team said, “We had an advantage over these rich Colleges.
“RHS has proved that despite a pupil’s’ township background, you can achieve a top-class matric result and pursue a University degree.”
A power-pairing system is used in the draw process and the teams are confident that they will progress beyond their 2013 break into the Gauteng Championships.
“National will be a super way to end my high school career. We have done it before,” says RHS debater, Austin Makhado.
