This E-Mail has been sent to all member schools of DSG on 22nd JUL 2024
>>>
Dear Coaches,
another school year comes to a close, so we want to give you an update both for the season this year and the one next year.
1. Winners
Congratulations again to all the teams who made it to the Finals Day (15th June 2024) in Senior League and Finals Weekend (5th-7th July 2024) in Junior League.
Senior League 2023/24 was won by Goethe-Gymnasium Karlsruhe against the Runner-Up from Parler-Gymnasium Schw. Gmünd debating the motion TH prefers a world in which the concept of money was never invented.
Junior League 2023/24 was won by Goethe-Gymnasium Emmendingen against the Runner-Up from Karls-Gymnasium Stuttgart debating the motion THBT friends are more important than family.
2. Dates for the Upcoming Season:
Both Leagues:
Registration - Sun Sep 1 - Sat Oct 5 2024
Motion release - Sun Oct 13 2024
Judges Briefing - Tue Nov 19 2024 (evening, online)
Senior League:
1/2 - Sat Nov 30 2024
3/4 - Fri Jan 31 2025
WüBu - Mar 21-23 2025
Finals - Sat May 31 2025
Junior League:
1/2 - Fri Jan 17 2025
3/4 - Sat Feb 15 2025
5/6 - Fri Apr 4 2025
Finals - Jun 27-29 2025 (Tübingen)
3. More on motions
Below you can find the links to the motion feedback forms on the motions of the last season and the motion suggestion forms for the prepared motions for next year. Please fill them out to improve the quality and diversity of the motions for future seasons. The deadline for the motion suggestion form is the registration deadline Sat Oct 5 2024.
Motions Feedback & Prepared Motion Suggestions
The first two links are feedback questionnaires designed to allow you to rate and criticize the motions of the recently completed 2023/24 season. These questionnaires are addressed to all participants of Junior and Senior League: coaches, but also debaters and independent judges. We kindly ask you not only to fill in these questionnaires yourself, but also to forward them to your students so they too have the opportunity to contribute.
The third link leads to a suggestion form for next season's prepared motions. It is only meant for coaches. An exception applies for teams not coached by a teacher. These teams may select one of their team members to submit suggestions on their behalf instead.
The forms are processed completely anonymously and no personal data of any kind is stored by DSG. Your answers will only be used internally in an effort to improve motions going forward.
Junior League Motions Feedback: https://forms.gle/XDB5Qzb87vXKEyYy8
Senior League Motions Feedback: https://forms.gle/VCiFiKCkZukBjkQZ6
Prepared Motions suggestions for 2023/24 (one response per team, coaches only): https://forms.gle/7LFrGR3vFDyZvoAZ9 (by Sat Oct 5th 2024)
Judges' Training Materials Working Group
As was decided at this year's Senior League assembly in Würzburg, a working group will be convened this summer to review, discuss, and (if necessary) update the existing training materials for SL and JL judges. The group is open to all adult judges and coaches of both tournaments. We expect that time commitment for participants will be around 10 hours in total, comprising 2-3 online meetings and reading the existing materials. The first meeting will likely take place in early August. If you are interested in helping out, please contact Alex Seitz (
New Senior League Organization Team
The Senior League organization team welcomes two new members! Caroline Pottgiesser and Leander Matthissen have kindly volunteered to take up this additional responsibility, joining the returning co-organizers Sunny Lorenz and Alex Seitz in the upcoming season.
4. More on judging
We have already scheduled a combined judges meeting at the beginning of the season for both leagues. This meeting is intended for all coaches to coordinate the judging standards for the upcoming season and is thus mandatory. Please also invite interested senior debaters as they are already eligible to judge in Junior League. The judges briefing will also explain how conferral judging works, which will be implemented only in Senior League on a trial basis next year.
The Annual SL Meeting in Wüzburg also suggested to form a working group to create material for judges' training. If you would like to help out with your ideas or questions please contact Alex Seitz (
5. Changes for the next season
Our working group for the SL/JL rules will update the rules according to the changes that were voted on in the Annual SL Meeting in Wüzburg (e.g. conferral judging an teams with no adult judge). We will attach the newest version of the rules in the registration form for the next season.
We will include a mandatory media consent form with the registration that allows DSG e.V. to use pictures and videos from debate meets for social media and promotion.
Unfortunately, we have run into very big organisational problems this year in Junior League due to the amount of last minute team drop-outs for some of the rounds. The OrgComm had to create draw changes featuring seven Mixed Teams and ended up closing down venues to be able to facilitate the remaining debates. We understand that sudden illnesses and conflicting school schedules makes it sometimes impossible to attend all dates, but we would still urge you to consider the impact drop-outs have on the host, organisers and opponents who all have to make adjustments and deal with the frustration of debates not taking place. It is possible to complete a debate with only two speakers ("iron-manning") or borrowing speakers from other teams, as long as this is clearly flagged in the marksheet (cf. 7.3. Missing speakers of the rules).
Nevertheless, we decided to implement certain changes for next year regarding drop-outs:
- We will have more teams per venue (at least 6, ideally 8), so that if drop-outs occur, the draw and judges availability is not that much affected. This unfortunately means that travel times may increase and not all schools who offer to host may get the chance to do so.
- We will only announce the motions and the venues for the whole season on Oct 13 2024, the draw with sides will always be sent out four weeks before the debate meet.
- Dropping out for any round leads to the team being ineligible to break into finals and no speakers of that team being featured in the speaker ranking.
- We will push back the grace period for readjusting the draw back to 7 days before the debate day because with our OrgComm consisting solely of university students and young professionals, we had to realize this year that they simple lack the time to make this many last minute adjustments.
We hope these measures will make sure that the debate rounds run a bit more smoothly for all the teams participating, and the fun and learning opportunity of the competition become an integral part of the experience again.
6. Annual General Meeting 2024
The AGM is currently set to take place on Sat 28th Sep 2024. Please save the date and await our formal invite to all DSG members.
This is all for now, you will hear back from us about season planning at the end of August or beginning of September when registration opens.
Enjoy the summer break,
Vivian Schreier and Christopher Sanchez
<<<