Governor’s School Competes in National Competition
A team from The Maggie Walker Governor’s School won third place after competing over the weekend in the Center for Civic Education’s We The People – The Citizen and the Constitution national competition begun in 1987 in Washington.
Maggie Walker placed third in the country.
McGuire: Twenty-one students were divided into six small teams and they debate a variety of constitutional questions with scholars, public officials, former members of Congress.
Matt McGuire coaches the all-senior team.
And they are scored essentially on their knowledge of the issues and how effectively they can hold up under the sort of pressure you’d get at an congressional hearing or even sort of an oral argument in front of the Supreme Court.
Each unit prepares three four-minute speeches. On the day of the competition one speech is presented to three judges who ask questions for six minutes. In 2003 Maggie Walker won the competition. In fact the school holds a record 10 top ten finishes:
McGuire: What distinguishes our team the most what I like to think is the inventiveness of argument. We’re lucky to have tremendous support from the professional scholarly community. There are about 25 attorneys and college professors who work with the team in some capacity.
John Ogle, WCVE News
Post new comment