Author: Mo Lovatt

On Friday 21 March, four schools from the north, south, east and west of England, competed in the Debating Matters House of Lords Championship 2025.  This was the third visit to the House of Lords for DM and students from each of the four schools rose to the occasion as they challenged each other in a range of contemporary debates, such as ‘Humanity should fear advances in artificial intelligence’ and ‘We should build on the green belt‘.

Continue reading “Debating Matters comes to the House of Lords for the third time”

Debating Matters’ Beyond Bars is a project which takes DM’s schools-debating format inside prisons. Using our acclaimed substance-over-style format, teams of prisoners engage in debate with one another on a whole range of contemporary social, political and cultural topics. The programme aims to inspire participants to think about issues beyond their current situation and to look forward to their life ahead – in other words, beyond bars!

INTRODUCING BEYOND BARS

Initiated in 2015, Beyond Bars has run successful programmes in a number of UK prisons, most recently in August 2023 at HMP Bronzefield, the largest women’s prison in the UK.  Next month, we will take the project into HMP Five Wells in Wellingborough.

The DM team working with prisoners in HMP Bronzefield

Using a selection of the Debating Matters Topic Guides, the prisoners will be tasked with conducting extensive research on a range of political and social issues such as

Continue reading “Debating Matters set to take its acclaimed programme Beyond Bars into HMP Five Wells”

On Saturday 1 March 2025, Ideas Matter, together with the Bill of Rights Institute, broke new ground. Three teams each from the US and the UK gathered online for the first ever Debating Matters Transatlantic Championship, co-hosted between Debating Matters and the Bill of Rights Institute. It was an intense and thrilling day of debate, across five time zones!

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In June 2024 Debating Matters held its North-East championship at Durham University’s Pemberton Buildings, in partnership with the Durham Union Society. Teams from six schools across the North-East of England gathered to battle it out for the top prize. Motions debated included:
Humanity should fear advances in artificial intelligence
Assisted dying should be legalised
Corporate sponsorship is good for the arts. 

After an intense day of top-notch debating Yarm School emerged as the victors, narrowly beating Durham Johnston School in the final by convincing judges that Populism is not a threat to democracy.Team member Nila also won the ‘Best Individual Debater’ prize, in recognition of how well she demonstrated deep independent research, genuine engagement with the subjects at hand, and an ability to handle questions and feedback with aplomb. Her prize comprised six tickets to a Royal Opera House show and a week’s work placement at the Newcastle offices of law firm, Womble Bond Dickinson.

Continue reading “Yarm School wins DM Durham championship and ‘best individual’ Nila tells us about the exciting prize she won.”

Students from six UK schools gathered in the iconic Grade I listed building, 55 Broadway, in heart of Westminster on Thursday 6 July to compete in the Debating Matters London Championship 2023.

Free Speech was the theme of the Debating Matters London Champions 2023 as six schools from across London and the Home Counties came together at the iconic Grade I listed building of 55 Broadway. Co-hosted with Blue Orchid Hospitality the championship took place on Thursday 6 July this year. Students debated a range of topics focused on 21st Century issues surrounding free speech and open debate. Aylesbury Grammar School, Harris Academy Chobham, Cardinal Newman Catholic School, The Grey Coat Hospital, Oundle School and Richmond upon Thames College took part in a series of high-quality debates throughout the day. Judges from a range of sectors including Law & Politics, Art & the Media, Health, Sport and Education asked a series of pertinent questions of the students and pushed them to find their best argument.

Continue reading “Aylesbury Grammar School wins the Debating Matters London Championship 2023!”

While school pupils are being admonished for ‘wrong-think’, Debating Matters provides a vital corrective: free, open and frank debate.

This news item was originally written as a guest post for the Academy of Ideas substack.

Earlier this year, when Debating Matters launched the 20 for 20 programme to celebrate its twentieth anniversary, the idea was to raise our profile, post-Covid, after a sustained period in which school debate had been severely restricted. We are now in full swing, having delivered 10 out of the 20 events so far.

Schools debating is precious and worth supporting. In the USA, however, it is under threat from cancel culture – and we cannot let that happen here.

Continue reading “Cancel culture comes for debate in schools”

On Thursday 8 June Durham Union Society will play host to the Debating Matters Durham Championship 2023. Students from North East schools will come together for a day of intense but thrilling debate as they take on issues such as, “Billionaires owning media companies is bad for democracy” and “Cancel Culture is a threat to freedom of speech”.

Continue reading “Durham Union Society to host the Debating Matters Durham Championship 2023”

Students from four UK schools gathered in the heart of Westminster on Friday 10 March to compete in the Debating Matters House of Lords Championship 2023. And what an inspiring day of debate it was!

The Burgate School took on competitors from three other schools and faced tough questions from judges and audience members to emerge as winners of the DM House of Lords Championship. 

Continue reading “The Burgate School wins the Debating Matters House of Lords Championship 2023!”

From Gujurat to Leeds… DM has been inspiring young people around the globe!

Debating Matters’ reach has extended further than Europe in the last two years. In 2020, former director of DM and current curriculum manager for Mathematics at MidKent College, Tony Gilland, developed a highly successful new pilot debating tournament – DMGBIN – for 16- to 18-year- old students in India and the UK which was inspired by his work at Debating Matters.

Continue reading “Inspired by Debating Matters”