Day six - Victory number one

Today was our final day being hosted by Cornell. After a morning of debate tour admin and a bit of motion preparation, we headed up to the Campus to help teach Sam's debating class (students actually take classes and get credits for debating here!). We started with a show debate for the 70 or so students, along with some of the Cornell debate team members, on the topic of banning fraternities and sororities (a topic we have been quite intrigued by when talking to students here). It was a great motion, and we had a good debate on it. Along with Chris, we then delivered some short talks on different aspects of 'advanced debating'. It went quite well.

After dashing to sort out buying a cell phone, grabbing dinner and changing we headed back to Campus for the public debate, on "This house believes Britain is still relevant", which we were opposing. It was a very entertaining and lively debate which we both enjoyed, where the points of clash included issues such as whether England's defeat in the World Cup constituted irrelevancy, and whether the Quidditch on Cornell campus was indicative of British primacy, as well as questions of economics and power in international relations. Chris Croke adjudicated, and the treason we had committed was justified by the first victory of our tour.

We again headed out with some of the Cornell debaters for our final evening in Cornell, before moving a short drive across town tomorrow to Ithaca College. We've been incredibly lucky to have such amazing hosts at our first stop, particularly in Sam, and we are both excited about the rest of the tour and sad to leave Cornell.