The Crusader - Fall 2011 September 20, 2011 - St Paul's High School

Leading the Floor
CLASS OF 2011
Debating Continues to Play a Strong Roll at St Paul’s
Debate and public speech are central elements
of a Jesuit education. St Paul’s has seen a
number of great high school debaters graduate
and excel in public life after graduation. Names
such as Stuart Blake, David Ernst, Antonio
Buccini, Paul Grower, Farai Vyamucharo-Shawa,
Martyn Langstaff ’08 and Ethan Chess ’10 come
to mind. The article below expands on the 2010-
2011 year in senior debate.
On 1 March, 2011 the St Paul’s High School
debating team was faced with the challenge of
improving on last year’s strong showing at the
Angus Reid Senior Debating tournament which
saw Ethan Chess ’10 and Douglas Feltham ’10
win first place, closely followed by Steve Lorteau
’11 and Alex Izydorczyk ’11 who won third place.
A multitude of teams representing ten schools
debated the pros and cons of Western Canadian
secession from Confederation. At this tourney, St
Paul’s was represented by some of its best senior
debate team: Miguel Perez and Anthony
Wightman; Louie Burg and Petey Nawrocki;
Peyton Veitch and Xxavier Barra; Andrew Konopelny
and Joseph Broda; Alex Izydorczyk and
Steve Lorteau. The team successfully improved
on last year’s performance with four debaters
earning a top eight ranking. Steve Lorteau was
ranked first in individual scoring, followed closely
by Alex Izydorczyk in second position, Joseph
Broda in third and Andrew Konopelny in eighth.
Andrew and Joseph also won second place
medals as a team and Alex and Steve won first
place medals as a team. But the success of the St
Paul’s debating program is not just limited to this
year’s showing at the Angus Reid.
Last year the St Paul’s debating duo of Alex
Izydorczyk and Steve Lorteau represented the
school and the province at the 2010 debate
Nationals held in Victoria. They went into the
first round of debate against a member of the
world school debating championship winning
team from Calgary. The Albertan team handed
Steve and Alex’s first loss in a narrow 3-2 that was
decided by a mere three points. The resolution for
this debate was “This house believes that
Capitalism is beneficial to the world.” After this
crushing defeat, Steve and Alex strung together
five straight victories including two against
Canadian national team members. In 4 of these
victories, impromptu topics were used and they
had to prepare their case in 30 minutes and were
then given a side chosen at random. Resolutions
in the impromptu rounds included: “This house
would not allow mothers under 18 to have custody
of their children”, “This House would not
send female diplomats into countries where their
rights are not respected”, “This house would give
dictators immunity from prosecution” and “This
house would ban religious symbols in government
offices.” After this six rounds of debate, the
round robin was completed and the team finished
2 nd in team speaking points and was 0.20
points away from the 1 st place team from British
Columbia. In the playoffs, the team faced off
against a strong debating force ranked 7 th from
Ontario in the quarter finals. The resolution in
this debate was “This house believes pro sports
team should not draft players without a college
degree.” A coin flip determined that Alex and
Steve would take the proposition side in this debate
and defended their case very well throughout
this debate. However, the judges found that
side opposition won the debate in 3-2 decision
determined by only a few points. This debate
eliminated Steve and Alex’s hopes of winning the
national title. After all was said and done, Steve
and Alex finished 5 th out of 61 teams and merely
missed the individual top ten rankings.
This year, Steve Lorteau and Alex won 2 nd place
at the Oxford Cup qualifier. At the Oxford Cup
(formerly known as the North American Debate
Championship), Steve and Alex debated various
topics such as plastic surgery, second-strike
nuclear weapons and the invasion of North
Korea. After six rounds of British Parliamentary
debate, the team finished 18 th and individually
Steve finished 31 st and Alex finished 41 st . Steve
Lorteau, along with rising debating star, Michael
Honke went to the 2011 International Asper
Cup debating tournament where the team won
15 th and Steve won 8 th in individual rankings.
The senior debaters concluded the year with a
great finish at the Senior Provincials held at St
Mary’s Academy on 26 June, 2011. Steven
Lortaeu and Alex Izydorczyk earned silver
medals in team competition and Steven earned a
silver medal for his second place finish in individual
scoring.
Special thanks to Mr Chaze for his dedication to
the debating program over the years. Thanks also
go out to Mr Murphy for developing junior
debaters into great senior debaters.
GRADUATE AWARDS
Governor-General’s Medal
Alexander Izydorczyk
Father President’s Gold Medal
Blake Loiselle
Board of Director’s Silver Medal
Alexander Izydorczyk
St Paul’s College Father Gerard Sheridan SJ
Memorial Fund Scholarhsip Award
Andrew Konopelny
Father Barry Connolly SJ Athletic Award
DJ Lalama
St Paul’s Parent Guild Leadership Award
Wajih Zeid
Duncan Norrie Memorial Scholarship
Jess Neufeld
Acheson-Cadieux Memorial Award
McClay Sveinson
Jesuit Secondary Education
Association Award
Travis Braschuk
18 Crusader Fall 2011