On June 10th-11th, the 25th "FLTRP-Guocai Cup" National College Students English Debate Competition ushered in the first stage of the final. After two days of fierce competition, 145 participating teams in the competition made excellent speeches highlighting the vigorous and promising temperament of contemporary Chinese youth. Sun Fangrui and Zhang Ruiyao from the School of English Study 2019 represented Dalian University of Foreign Languages. After eight rounds of intense round-robin competition, two students won the national second prize, creating the best results of the School of English Study in the competition in recent years.

Talking about the harvest and reflection of the competition, Sun Fangrui and Zhang Ruiyao said: "First of all, I would like to thank Ms. Lu Wenyue, the instructor of the Debate Club of the School of English Study, for giving us careful guidance before the competition, constantly cheering us on during the competition, seriously reviewing with us after the competition, summarizing the shortcomings in thinking, jointly discussing the deep meaning behind the debate, and pointing out the direction for future thinking expansion and academic development. Teacher Lu stressed that based on the current era of change, the thinking of debaters must be forward-looking, and they need to keep up with the past knowledge reserves and ways of thinking as soon as possible." The two students believe that this point has a very profound guiding significance for both English debate and future academic development.

Secondly, the two students also have a deeper understanding of the English debate itself. Compared with the previous contest when they were immature, the two students have been able to establish a more comprehensive, powerful and profound argument in this competition after a lot of practice and review. Sun Fangrui said that English debate can effectively improve the ability of thinking and logic, and exercise the ability of language expression, which is the basis for growth and development. The difference between English debate and Chinese debate is that English debate is not about what is right or wrong, but about which side has discovered the social problems behind the topic and which side can better solve these problems.

As English majors, we spend most of our undergraduate four years trying to improve our language level and literary literacy, so we rarely have the opportunity to pay close attention to social issues and current events and think about the deep meaning behind them. However, English debate just provides us with such an opportunity to see the other side of society, the vast world outside the ivory tower of the school. The harvest of English debate is not how much our teachers and opponents teach us, but how much we learn in the process. Thank you very much for English debate, which helps us improve our ability and gain valuable friendship. Finally, this competition has also brought a successful end to the four years of undergraduate study for the two students. The two students hope that the English Debating Club will become better and better and make new achievements!

The School of English Study has always adhered to the two-way training mode of language ability and critical thinking ability, combined content teaching with ideological and political education, and achieved good results. This competition will further promote the personalized training of the School of English Study, and improve students' language and critical thinking ability. (Lu Wenyue)