To learn more about the astonishing success of the debater and medical student Jan Castel in the German version of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?", please read the German version of the article. xzy / glx

The Debattierclub Regensburg has a new website and also reports a notable growth in membership. xzy / tr

Debating goes to the Croatian Adriatic: from May 18 to 20, the Split Debating Union invites to the Split Union Open. Chief adjudicators are Jeroen Heun (ESL EUDC finalist 2011), Rabejaona Setry Randriamananoro Rola and Luka Keller. The prelim speeches are going to be five minutes long, in the semis and the final you are going to have seven minutes. Registration has already opened for teams and adjucators separately, team cap is 32 teams while n-1 applies. Reg fee is €40 per person. To stay up-to-date, visit the Faceboook page of the Split Union Open. If you have any other questions, please ...

One weekend, two tournaments: The School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) is going to host not only the Game of Thrones IV on Sunday, June 10, but also the Football Open on June 9. Whilst the IV is all about the "Game of Thrones" fantasy saga, the Football Open offers motions on "the opium of the masses" and "the matter that's more important than life or death". Why? Because "it is time to recognise that there is only one area of interest that billions of people follow passionately around the world", as the org com puts it. CAs are Manos Moschopoulos, ...

Please read the German version to learn more about this tournament in Marburg, which is named after the famous collectors of folk tales Brothers Grimm.

If you are a Game of Thrones devotee, you will have plenty of reason for delight. For the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) invites to the Game of Thrones IV on Sunday, June 10. Convenor Alexander Cavell and his team announce on the tournament's Facebook page that "all motions will concern contemporary and timeless issues of Westeros, the Lands beyond the Sea and the Iron Islands". "Game of Thrones" is fantasy television series based on George Raymond Richard Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" series of novels. Although the CAs Manos Moschopoulos, Raj Zal Shukla and David Jones are ...

No change at the Swiss Debating Club St. Gallen this time: Julian Bodenschatz, Martin Kirsch, Fabian Schmidt-Skipiol and president Andrej Woerner have been re-elected again. Congratulations and good luck with your work!

The new executive board of Debatte Karlsruhe consists of Johannes Janosovits, Moritz Klammler, Thank Thank Nguyen, Jan Kaufmann, and Frederik Diehl. Congratulations and good luck with your work!

A little exchange at Debattierclub München: Viviane Clarin follows Veronika Gerzer as vice president. Julian Priebe and Katharina Heine remain president and treasurer respectively. Congratulations and good luck with your work! xzy / ...

That was the decision made by the audience after the first show debate of debatING. Kaiserslautern. On November 7, the government consisting of Willy Witthaut, Clemens Fucker and Katharina Tschirner (all of DCJG Mainz) competed with the oppositional professors Michael Hassemer (economics), Sven O. Krumke (maths) and Walter Ruda (business administration) about whether Dagobert Duck should share his fortune with Donald Duck. At the end, the audience voted for the professors to win the debate – poor Donald! You can enjoy the whole show debate on YouTube. xzy / ...

Come to Warwick IV: On February 4, Susan Connolly, Yina Koh and Lindsay Bing are going to CA four prelims, semis and final with five-minute-speeches. Reg fee is £40, n-1 applies. Registration is already opened, more information please check the website of the Warwick Debating Society or the tournament's Facebook page. There is going to be a „fantastic club social on the Saturday night“ with lots of pizza and drinks. If you have any questions, please contact the org com at su315@sunion.warwick.ac.uk. xzy / tr

Oxford Women's Open from January 20 to 21 means debating without men – only female debaters and judges are admitted. The same is true of the chief adjudication team consisting of Catherine Murphy (Trinity College Dublin Historical Society) and Jen Coyne (Oxford Union). Catherine is a Euros finalist 2011 and also topped the tab there. Jen broke to quarters at the Euros 2010 in Amsterdam and at the Worlds 2011 in Gaborone, Botswana. Reg fee is 20 British Pound (about 24 Euros) per institution, no matter how many teams an institution sends. Mixed teams are welcome, too. Registration is already open, if ...

"BP comes to BP": That means an opportunity to participate in an extra tournament before Vienna IV 2012. The debating societies of Central European University and Corvinus University Budapest are going to host the first international tournament in Hungary from March 2 to 5. Registration is already opened until January 10. To registrate, you need firstly to express your will to participate in an e-mail at budapestopen2012@gmail.com. After sending this e-mail, you are going to receive a registration form that have to be filled out and sent back. After that, you are going to receive a confirmation letter. The reg fee ...

The Association of Debating Societies at Universities (VDCH) has announced the details on the first adjudication workshop in the current season 2011/2012. From February 4 to 5, judges with basic experience can deepen their analytical and feedback skill in the Rhineland-Palatinate capital Mainz. Trainers will be Andrea Gau (Mainz), Torsten Rössing (Halle), Pauline Leopold (Tübingen) and Lukas Haffert (Cologne). Both BPS and Open Parliamentary Debate (OPD)will be covered. Reg fee is 15 Euros and registration is opened until January 15. To registrate, please contact VDCH vice-president Simeon Reusch via simeon.reusch@vdch.de. The number of spots is limited to 25. xzy / tr ...

This article is not available in English, please read the German version.

Carsten Meyer, board member for public relations of Streitkultur Berlin, has redesigned the homepage of his debatins society. It contains news from Streitkultur Berlin as well as the club's history and general information on debating. xzy / tr

Please check the German version of this article to read our review on two German online debating platforms, debatare.de and sagwas.net. xzy / apf

After they were founded in 2004 and a subsequent debating pause, BiTS Debating Society at the private university of applied sciences BiTs in Iserlohn, North Rhine-Westphalia is active again. Their newly elected executive board, Julian Vaterrodt and Jan-Lasse Schumacher, plan to participate in as many tournaments as possible. They even travelled to the Edingburgh Cup 2011 – to read their impressions, please refer to the German version of this article. The final video on the motion "This house believes that the world was a safer place during the cold war" is available on the Facebook site of BiTS Debating Society: part 1, ...

A Golden Jubilee for Debattierclub München? Well, not quite. But this year, Munich's debating society is ten years old, and that is why they invite alumnis and active members to celebrate – of course, by debating. The jubilee tournament on October 29 and 30 offers four preliminary rounds on Saturday and a public final on Sunday at 11 a. m., besides that there will be a Saturday night social. The prelims will take place at Katholischen Hochschulgemeinde (on the premises of a catholic student group), Leopoldstraße 11, the location for the final will be Vorhölzer Forum (Arcisstraße 21). To provide enough judges ...

A premiere in Stuttgart: On December 10 and 11, the convenor Andreas Lazar invites the debating circuit to the society's first international tournament. Top-class debaters like Michael Saliba (WUDC 2011 semi-finalist), Maja Cimerman (EUDC ESL champion 2010) and Daniël Springer (EUDC 2011 semi-finlast) will serve as CAs. Andreas believes that "it is time to give back to the international debating community we've enjoyed so much over the past years" and promises an "ideal Worlds prep two weeks before Manila". The tournament offers five rounds, semis and a final. Speech duration is seven minutes, team cap is 36. Reg fee is €35 Euros ...

The second season of the Free Debating League begins with two new coordinators Daniil Pakhomenko and Manuel Adams who succeed Lukas Haffert, the former vice-president of the Association of Debating Societies at Universities, or VDCH. FDL isa series of opens and smaller tournaments in addition to the big tournaments of the ZEIT DEBATTEN series. The first season's winner was the WUDC 2013 host Berlin Debating Union. xzy / apf

WFI-Debattierclub in Ingolstadt has a new executive board. Alexander Schult and David Günther have been elected president and vice-president respectively. David Pecher is responsible for finance and Yannick Steinmann is the new secretary. Ingolstadt's debating society is going to host the Southern German regional SDM next year on April 21 and 22. Congrats and good luck! xzy / apf

Save the date: March 9 to 11! On these three days, the Vienna IV 2012 is going to take place as Debattierklub Wien announced. Further details will be promoted on Achte Minute as soon as possible. This year, Austin Schwartz and Travis Steele won the Vienna IV final as Colgate Extra White from the position of Opening Government on the motion "This house believes that parties’ electoral campaigns should only be funded by the state". Their counterparts were Galatasaray, Heidelberg and Belgrade. The final is also available online. About three months after the IV, Vienna is going to be the venue ...

The international debating community does not stand still. In April, Jacobs University Bremen (JUB) Debating Society is planning the Jacobs Open 2012 from 13 to 15. A mentionable fact: Alyona Asyamova from JUB Bremen won with her team partner Rob Honig (Leiden) the ESL final of Amsterdam Open 2009. And the victory at Jacobs Open 2011 fell to Becky West and Rogier Baart (Leiden Debating Union) in an all-Dutch final debate on the motion "This house would promote atheism". Manuel Adams (Berlin Debating Union) compiled a picture gallery and has put it online. xzy / apf

The International Debate Academy Slovenia (or IDAS) is a truly outstanding event. From November 19 to 27, IDAS brings together international participants and leading debating experts from all over the world. Bojana Skrt's org com is pleased to present the ESL EUDC champions (among others) 2010 Maja Cimerman and Filip Dobranic as well as the ESL WUDC champion 2008 Anne Valkering and Manos Moschopoulos (ESL EUDC finalist 2010, best ESL speaker WUDC 2010) as trainers. Until November 24, IDAS offers a wide range of workshops all around debating complemented by intense practice debates. This part of IDAS takes place in the ...

The UCU Open fits into the series of tournaments in the coming debating season. Hosted already for the second time by the Dutch University College Utrecht (UCU) Debating Union on November 4 and 5, this Open will be "bigger and " according to the org com. Convenor Marlies Hombergen and her team offer five prelims, a semifinal and a final. Registration has already opened (n-1 applies). CA  the ESL world champion Anne Valkering (ASDV Bonaparte), reg fee is €25. Crash accommodation will be provided both from Friday to Saturday and from Saturday to Sunday. More information is available ...

The Crazy IV offers on October 15 a tournament of a very special kind. The University of Strathclyde's convenor Sorana Goga promises on the Facebook page: "We are going to bring to you a set of original motions, each one set in a fantasy world/alternate reality based either on a film or book ranging from Harry Potter to Inception and going through everything in between". The relevant books and films are to be announced shortly. But why would one organise such an uncommon debating competition? Their inspiration was their last year's successful show debate on topic "This house would tell the ...

Deutschlandradio interviewed Marcus Ewald, vice president of the umbrella organization Association of Debating Societies at Universities (VDCH or Verband der Debattierclubs an Hochschulen). To read what Marcus has to say on speaking in public, see the online version of the interview. xzy / apf

The new executive board of Debattierclub München is composed of Julian Priebe, Veronika Gerzer and Katharina Heine. Congratulations and good luck with your work! xzy / tr

Sorry, this entry is only available in German.