Jugend Debattiert

This year GASA, for the first time, had a class participating in Jugend Debattiert, the German International Debate Program.

Students and teachers got together, once a week for over 2 month to get to know the ins and outs of the program and how to construct a successful debate in German. Everybody got to know and rehearse the structure and phrases to debate their pro or con arguments.  We are thanking Gabriele Mais-Minkler and Florian Nestman from ZFA, the Central Agency for Schools Abroad, for teaching us. 

The regional finals for the German Youth Debate tournament 2023 were upon us on May 20,2023. We had 3 students participating. Leonard F., Sage K. and Maximilian M. debated diligently about “should influencers have to mark their photos if they are edited” and “should all teenagers have to have a tracking app installed”. The day started with greetings from Katharina Grueninger, Cultural Affairs Section from the German Embassy in Washington DC. Then with help from a lot of volunteers from Germany and the US all online debates started on Saturday morning at 9.45 am.  We had 24 students battling it out, to get one of the coveted spots to the finals in October in Washington, DC.  We are very proud of our students and congratulating them on performing outstandingly, making new friends and hopefully had a good time. We will be preparing for next year and are very convinced we will go to Washington, DC next year. 🙂