Debate

Every lecture, we will have a debate on an approach that was championed by the focus paper. Each student will do at least two debates, one arguing for and one arguing against the merits of approach. The debates may be done in teams of maximally two people.

Structure

We will use an alternating debate scheme, beginning with the affirmative team, where each team has in total 5 minutes to speak per round. There will be two rounds in total. Between the two rounds, there will be a deliberation phase, where each team will have the chance to discuss their rebutting arguments with the non-debating students in the class.

Round 1 - intro:

• Affirmative team - 5 minutes

• Negative team - 5 minutes

Deliberation - 5 minutes

• Non-debating students randomly assigned to discuss with affirmative or negative team

Round 2 - rebuttal:

• Affirmative team - 5 minutes

• Negative team - 5 minutes

The first and last minute of these 5 minutes are protected and no interruption is allowed. In between, questions by the audience or the opposing side are allowed. The speaker can allow or reject the question. However, admitting questions will be viewed favourably. Posing the question cannot last longer than 15 seconds.

Grading

We will use the following debate rubric for grading. Furthermore, after each debate, we will poll all students to re-rate the paper to see if their opinion changed compared to the initial review.