Newsletter June

Hi there! Before you lies the first newsletter of de Debatbond! Through monthly newsletters we would like to keep you informed on what is happening in the Dutch debating community. Enjoy!

A couple of weeks ago, the Dutch Debating League (DDL) ended its great first year with the final evening in Tilburg. After two intense debates the final ranking of the DDL is as follows:

Congratulations to the Leiden Debating Union for winning the first edition! We believe the DDL has been a great way for the Dutch Debating community to come together and have high quality debates. We would like to thank all debaters, judges, societies and CA’s for making the DDL a great success.

The DDL will be back next year. There is a survey online which you can fill in with any feedback, thoughts or comments that you might have, and expect some concrete improvements/plan very soon!

Link: https://goo.gl/forms/mqzRQFcmHas8x2253 (Nederlands) https://goo.gl/forms/sZ67bqfRvnRwqQZI2 (English)

De Debatbond organized a day full of workshops for sitting and upcoming boardmembers of the student debating societies in the Netherlands. Three different workshops were being given. Jos Buijvoets gave a workshop on how to activate members and how members can be involved in organizing events. Andrea Bos gave a workshop on how to be a board: what should a board take into consideration during their year? The last session existed of a workshop and a brainstorm about promotion and acquisition, led by De Kleine Consultant.

We thought the besturendag was a major success, with over 25 participants from 10 different societies. There will be a follow-up around December of this year!

You’ve probably noticed that the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) went into effect on the 25th of May. Even though the GDPR has been extensively discussed during the previous Bondsraad, we want to reiterate that everyone should be careful with personal information: so don’t ask for information that you don’t necessarily need and always ask permission to use information. This means that the new privacy regulation is important for debating societies, especially during the registration of new members and the organization of tournaments. If you have any questions, or if you want help with making new registration forms, don’t hesitate to ask Ybo.

As you might have seen at Facebook, we published a questionnaire. We would like to hear what we can do for you, your debating society, or the Dutch debating scene in general in the upcoming year. With this input we will work to improve and promote the debating sport. If you have any questions about this questionnaire, please send an e-mail to info@debatbond.nl.

You can find the questionnaire over here:

https://goo.gl/forms/e8Z6NkmhlQU3Obdy2 (Nederlands)

https://goo.gl/forms/D54ZyYqn3VnRzHxj2 (English)

In this sector, which will be standard within upcoming newsletters, we will look back at past tournaments: who won and who was best speaker?

The only tournaments that took place in June were the Amsterdam Open, a BP tournament organized by ASDV Bonaparte and the Dutch Mace, organized by the Leiden Debating Union. More than 30 teams participated at the Amsterdam Open. Rory Flynn and John Karellis eventually won the tournament, on a 4 – 1 split with Jop and Rianne. Best speaker was: Rory Flynn.

The Dutch Mace is happening while this newsletter is going online, so we can’t update you about the winners just yet. We do wish all contestants the best of luck!

This section will be standard within the upcoming newsletters as well. For the upcoming months there is not much on the agenda within the Netherlands, as the summer approaches. A large delegation of Dutch debaters will represent their universities at the European Universities Debating Championship in Novi Sad (Serbia) between the 30th of July and the 5th of August. We will report on their progress as it happens!

Do you have any recommendations for this newsletter? Please contact Tom Pouw on Facebook or mail to info@debatbond.nl