CHAMPIONS CORNER
China Gold became the first international team to win the USA World Schools Debate Invitational last June. Team members (from left to right): Benjamin Ye, Yang (Lucas) Chen, Zimo (Crystal) Liao, Junhe (Lawrence) Ma, and Zhi (Bobby) Liu.
TEAM CHINA GOLD:
Teamwork Really Does Make the Dream Work in World Schools Debate by Vivek Rajdev
I
n June 2025, team China Gold and their coach David Peterson traveled from Shanghai to Des Moines to compete in World Schools Debate (WS) at the National Tournament. Over the days that followed, the team’s cohesion, presentation, and strategy cinched them the national title— making China Gold the first international team to win the World Schools championship in National Tournament history. Team members Lucas Chen, Crystal Liao, Bobby
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Liu, Lawrence Ma, and Benjamin Ye found WS through markedly different paths. Crystal came from years of Model United Nations, drawn to WS for its sustained engagement with real-world issues, while Bobby entered speech and debate for a simpler reason: to build confidence as a shy student. Their team’s story offers a unique look at WS, especially its culture, emphasis on collaboration, and habits of preparation that can enable success. China Gold’s achievement was the result of a roster
that took shape gradually. Crystal, Bobby, and Lawrence had debated together before reuniting at an online WS tournament in January 2025 to prepare for June. Lucas and Ben joined later, when coach David Peterson invited them to compete at Nationals and complete the lineup. Early practices were not seamless. Like many large World Schools teams, they initially struggled with fragmentation. Simply dividing labor led to parallel thinking rather than a
coherent case. The solution came when they adopted a simple rule: communicate everything out loud, support one another, and give every voice space in prep. The new approach also reframed how they understood a five-person team. “A larger team is not about generating more ideas,” Ben reflects, “but about building a single, coherent strategy together.”
Clarifying Responsibilities Over time, everyone’s responsibilities were clarified. Framing and weighing were handled collectively at the end of prep so that everyone understood how the winner of the round would ultimately be decided. Between rounds, long debriefs discussing mistakes, recalibrating strategy, and decompressing helped the team bond in-person. The newfound trust eventually manifested during the flurry of competition. Bobby recalls