Dear Coaches and Debaters,
On behalf of the McGill Debating Union, we are pleased to invite you to the 4th annual ‘McGill
Winter Debating Bonanza.’
Date: January 29th-30th, 2016
Location: McGill’s downtown campus in Montreal
Registration Fee: $140 per team (deposit of $100 required by the registration deadline)
Registration Deadline: Please send in your deposits by January 13th, 2016. After this date we
cannot guarantee that we will be able to accommodate your school.
Team Cap: There will be an 80 team cap at this tournament, filled on a first-paid, first-served
basis. Each school has a tentative 10 team cap, after which additional teams will be placed on a
waitlist, to be confirmed after the registration deadline. Hybrid teams are allowed to compete.
We will consider expanding the team cap if there is sufficient demand.
Format
The tournament will consist of six rounds of Canadian Parliamentary (CP) impromptu debate.
There is no prepared resolution. There will be two rounds on Friday night, and four rounds on
Saturday. The sixth round will be a hidden-quarter final and the tournament will break to open
semi-finals.
PM: 7 minutes
MO: 7 minutes
MC: 7 minutes
LO: 10 minutes
PM: 3 minutes
Points of information are expected and are allowed from the 1st to the 6th minutes of each of the
4 main speeches.
We will have a junior break at the tournament if enough teams register, and we will be
recognizing the top junior speaker and the top junior team at the tournament. To be considered a
junior team, both debaters must be in 9th grade (or below). Please indicate any junior debaters
when you register.
Registration
In order to be considered registered we must receive a deposit of $100 per team by the
registration deadline. Please note that all deposits are non-refundable and non-transferable: if a
registered team drops out, their deposit cannot be refunded or used to pay for the remaining
balance for other teams. Please register only as many teams as you intend to send. Finally, as per
the attached tentative schedule, please note that registration closes at 4:00pm on Friday January
29th. This means that you must sign in at the registration desk on the 4th floor of the Shatner
building before 4:00pm. It is very important that we run on time Friday night, as we only have
the building reserved until a certain hour. As such, we will drop teams who are late. Please
contact Genevieve Riccoboni at 514-570-1254 on the day of the tournament if you are running
late.
Accommodation
We have arranged a group rate with the Best Western Hotel at Peel and Sherbrooke. Rooms with
one or two queen beds are available. Rooms are $110 a night plus taxes. The rooms have been
blocked off until January 8th. To make a reservation please call 1-800-361-7791 and tell them
you are booking from the McGill Debating Union block of rooms. Reservations can also be
made online, in which case the reservation code is “DEBATING.”
Meals
We will provide dinner on Friday January 29th, and breakfast, lunch, and dinner on Saturday
January 30th. There will also be a reception for coaches on Saturday afternoon at which
refreshments will be served. Please provide us with any information relevant to special dietary
requirements in advance.
Clothing Orders
We will be selling a wide range of zesty and fashionable McGill Debating Union clothing, as we
have at previous tournaments. T-shirts will be $20 and hoodies will be $35, and they will be sold
at a booth at the tournament. We accept cash or cheque.
How to Register
Please make cheques payable to the “McGill Debating Union”
Please mail cheques (containing a deposit of $100 per team) to:
Greta Hoaken
McGill Debating Union c/o SSMU Front Desk
3480 McTavish Street
Montreal, QC H3A 1X9
The remainder of the balance can be paid at the registration desk on Friday, January 29th. To
complete your registration, please send us an email at winterbonanza2015@gmail.com. Please
put the name of your school in the title of your email, and provide us with the following
information:
School Name
Number of Teams
Name of Coach or Contact Person
Email
Phone Number
As soon as possible (i.e. at the time of registration, if known), and by January 17th, 2015 at the
latest, please provide us the following information:
Names of all debaters, please indicate which debaters are “juniors”,(in grade 9 or below)
Number of vegetarian debaters and other dietary restrictions.
Judging
Deborah
Tsao,
Harrison
Walsh, and Shayan Mantegh will act as Co-CAs for the tournament. They will be setting straight
motions that will cover a wide range of accessible topics.
Seminars
Continuing with past practice, we will be offering a variety of seminars over the course of the
tournament. Optional seminars will be offered in between rounds, catering to debaters of all
experience levels.
We look forward to seeing you in January!
Maria Fustic and Yasmine Abi-Hanna, Tournament Directors