Cate Competes at Ethics Bowl

February 21, 2025

By Andrew Peng ’26

 A team of six students from Ewe Speaks, the Cate speech and debate club, represented Cate at the Regional National High School Ethics Bowl competition in Los Angeles at Chapman University on Saturday, Feb 8. We had a great time competing and collaborating with teams from other schools on addressing various ethical dilemmas. It was also super rewarding to have the multiple weeks of preparation pay off (we met weekly throughout the winter months to prepare written stances for 16 distinct ethical dilemmas). Although we didn’t make it to the semi finals, we still learned a lot, and will be much more prepared when we head back to Ethics Bowl next year.

Thank you to Dr. Clair Dahm for helping the team prepare and to Lisa Rockel and KC Collins for admin support, transportation, and cheering us on the day of the competition.

Comments from the judges were: 
“Good organization and signposting”
“Your arguments and responses were always well thought out and presented well.  Your team is really impressive.”
“Thoughtful comments on a difficult case.”

More info on Ethics Bowl: 

This was one National Speech & Debate Association (NSDA) Regional event with 20 schools represented. Cate went 2-1 on the day, but only 4 advance to the semi rounds and the two finalists move on to Divisionals to compete for entry into State rounds. The majority of these top teams compete all year long in various debate styles so Cate competed against some very experienced teams and did quite well on some very heady subjects.

Cases are presented in front of three judges, who at the end spend time asking pointed questions regarding the stance before giving their overall scores. Rather than on the extent of their persuasiveness where judges are concerned, students are evaluated on the structural quality of their reasoning, sincere and empathetic engagement with the reasonable views of their peers, and their grappling with tough and nuanced issues. In this way, Ethics Bowl balances its competitive and collaborative aims.

• This element of the format designed to take seriously students’ role as serious moral thinkers in their own right, and as sources of authentic claims and knowledge in their communities.