Unlocking the Secret to Championship: Spring KNC Chamions Interview

Unlocking the Secret to Championship

Talks Interview: Champions of 2012 Spring KNC

Interviewed and Edited by Jya Hyun Albert Lee

Do you still remember? The memories of Spring KNC 2012 are slowly fading away, but your passion for debate is hopefully gaining momentum. We asked the KNC Champions, Grand Champion Team from CUDS (Chungang University Debating Society) and EFL Champion Team from DAE (Debate Association of Ewha), what their secret to championship was. If you hope to break in Fall KNC, here is the masters’ tip to the next Championship.

The Grand Final Round, featuring CUDS as government and EDiS as Opposition.

Grand Champion Team, CUDS(Chungang University Debating Society)

EFL Champion Team Representative, DAE(Debate Association of Ewha)

Would you briefly introduce yourself? Major and your hobby?

Taeyeong: Hello my name is Taeyeong Kim and I am majoring in English Language and Literature at Chung-Ang University. My hobbies are playing soccer, watching soccer and having a good time with my friends.

Seunghwan: My name is Seung-Hwan Hong, and I major in English language and literature. I like music, and I have been playing the piano for quite a while. Taeyeong and Mingeun are sick of my tapping my fingers on the desk while I prep.

Mingeun: I'm Min Geun Seo, majoring in B.A. in Chung-Ang University. I Love playing basketball and reading.

Jiyoung, EFL Champion: My name is Ji Young Choi. I am a junior of International Office Administration at Ewha. I am a rookie who started debating since this semester. I like to play the piano or watch the movie when I have some free time.

How did you start debating?

Taeyeong: I started debating in high-school and found it to be one of the most fun activities in my life. Afterwards I continued to do what I found fun.

Mingeun: I first got to know debating through 'Debate in Business class' during my freshmen year. After experiencing a mini tournament in class, I found debating pretty interesting. So I went to meet Logan and asked about CUDS. He told me great things about debating and that it will change my life. Eventually I decided to join CUDS and now a lot of great changes happend, thanks to debating.

How did you decide your team and your respective roles?

CUDS: Every CUDS team goes through the tryout where we rank each member based on the speaker score of each tryout round. Based on those scores we get a total rank where the first person gets to choose their teammate. Then it goes on. Taeyeong chose Seunghwan and Seunghwan chose Mingeun.

As for roles we considered what would bring the best advantage out of each speaker. As Taeyeong was comfortable with substantiating and problem setting he gets PM, while Mingeun can do swift rebuttals and making something sound really good he gets DPM and as Seunghwan can look at the debate on a holistic level, make fun out of people and really clear the debate up he gets Whip.

DAE: We had a tryout-debate to make up a team for KNC. After seeing the debate, we wrote a member of veto and preference according to their debating styles on a piece of paper, and gave it to senior members. Then after they considered it, our president announced the team members. That’s how our team was constructed. And for the roles, since my other teammates were the second and the whip speaker at the Rookie Tournament, which I didn’t participate, they wanted to maintain their roles. So I was to be the first speaker automatically

 CUDS, Champions of Spring KNC 2012

What do you think is the strength of your team?

Taeyeong: We have this thing for making people angry. But above that I believe our biggest strength is in our willingness to win, but if we lose we try to learn from our mistakes, listen to feedback and use that advice to win the next round.
Seunghwan: I think Taeyeong is very structured and eloquent, Mingeun is very critical and keen, and I don't have any of these things, but I can annoy people pretty well.
Mingeun: Youthfulness and a sense of humor.

Jiyoung: We complement each other. Especially Jin Soo Lee, the eldest member, was born to be a debater and was a good mental supporter of our team.

What is your further goal as a debater from now on?

Taeyeong: It is actually to become an experienced senior so I can pass on things I have learned to future debaters. To achieve that I would have to practice to a far greater extent that what I am doing right now.
Seunghwan: In one of the future tournaments I will meet NC in the finals and beat him (If you're reading this NC, let me live).
Mingeun: Make my speech funnier and maybe win another KNC title

Jiyoung: Main breaking is further goal as a team, and my personal goal is to rank as a best speaker.

Chief Adjudicator of Spring KNC, Hyewon Rho, Korea University, ready to be convinced.

Is there any special system or training that we can share together?

There was really nothing special in our training. The only things we did were practice, practice a little more and practice one last time. The amount of practice that we did was we did a mini-tournament during the weekends, went to session every single time, meet up on normal days to case prep and practice speeches and go to most of the adjudication tests to receive feedback and adjudication from more than a hundred adjudicators. We also had our separate team meetings after every single round to fix problems we had within our own speeches.


Debate with which team was unforgettable to you?

Taeyeong: Every single round was memorable. I would show deep respect to every single team that went against us. However if I were to choose one round I personally thought the first preliminary round was unforgettable. It was against UU 3 and it was the round where we lost. The reason why it was memorable was because I thought it was the round where we prepared most comfortably and easily. However, because we lost it we were under some mental collapse but this was the time where we had to bring back our mentality which we did the very next day.

Mingeun: Every single debate was unforgettable but especially EDIS B was the most memorable. We've met EDIS B in the last round of pre-lims and met them again in the grand finals. They were a very tough team and it was very fun to debate with them.

END.