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Students from across Canada gather for annual debate seminar

Students from across Canada gather for annual debate seminar

High school students from across Canada are touring Nova Scotia for the 50th anniversary of a national debating tournament.

Middleton Regional High School is playing host to the Canadian Student Debating Federation's annual seminar. Sixty-two students from various provinces will spend the next four days visiting locations in Halifax and the Annapolis Valley.

Morgan Lasalle, a Grade 9 student from Ottawa, applied to be one of the participants.

"It was really exciting. You apply for different categories and they told me I got in 'bilingual.' It's really fun," she said. Lasalle said a number of students from her school have competed in previous years.

"So I kind of got an idea of what it would be like."

'It's a little bit intimidating'

Ten students from Middleton's high school debate team helped prepare their school to host. Usually the event is held in larger urban centres and this is the first time the event has been held in a town of Middleton's size.

"It's a really great opportunity for the team to get to host such a big tournament. It was a lot of prep work, but it was a lot of fun," said Skylah Vanwagoner, a Grade 10 student.

"I think it's really exciting that it's one of the oldest competitions in Canada and we're hosting it in our tiny little high school," said Mia Fraser, a Grade 12 student at MRHS.

"I think it's interesting. It's a little bit intimidating. But I'm excited to debate with everyone."

Students to discuss Cornwallis

​The main resolution before the students is one that Haligonians continue to grapple with: whether Edward Cornwallis' name should be removed from public locations such as statues and streets.

Cornwallis was a British military officer who founded Halifax in 1749. He offered a cash bounty to anyone who killed a Mi'kmaq person, which was known as the "scalping" proclamation.

In May, Halifax municipal council decided by a narrow vote not to rename a statue of Cornwallis located in a public park. In 2011, the Halifax Regional School Board voted unanimously to change the name of a school named after Cornwallis.

Students at the debate seminar must present arguments both for and against removing the Cornwallis name.

"It's kind of hard to oppose the fact that Edward Cornwallis was a problematic man. But it's interesting to see the different point of views on it, and the history of Halifax and how it all came together," said Fraser.

Debate founder

The founder of the debate series, Tom Lawson, travelled to Halifax to see the students speak. Lawson founded the event in 1967.

"The whole point in getting them to debate was to see if we could have some influence in developing a new generation of kids, of people, with the basic tools to become effective citizen activists," he said.

Lawson hoped debating would encourage traits like broad-mindedness, recognition that there are two sides to every issue, and an interest in public affairs — and he feels rewarded, nearly 50 years later.

"Whenever I see these kids, any cynicism I ever had about young people goes right out the window," he said.

The debates will be held in Middleton Regional High School all day on Sunday, and are open to the public.