Tahir Chowdhry, Soham Mitra, and Gopal Kotwal hold awards statuettesTahir Chowdhry, Soham Mitra, and Gopal Kotwal emerged atop the rankings in the iSpeak debate competition held Thursday by the Centre for English Language Development.

Students argue with themselves to demonstrate verbal facility

Students working to improve their English language skills rose to the occasion March 1 at the Centre for English Language Development.

Debaters in the iSpeak competition engaged in the “turn-coat” style of argumentation, which required them to present ideas both in favour of and against a given proposition.

“This self-debate is a challenge even for native speakers,” says Katia Benoit, acting director of the Centre for English Language Development. “We were very pleased to see students demonstrate their ability to present and transition between both sides of an argument.”

The competitors were UWindsor and English Language Improvement students at level three of their training. The top three finishers are all graduate students of engineering: champion Tahir Chowdhry, second-place Soham Mitra, and third-place Gopal Kotwal.