Copenhagen summit

Dear sir or madam,

I am the founder and chief executive of Debatewise.com, a leading debating web site. I'm also on the board of the International Debate Education Association, one of the largest youth debating organisations in the world. I'm emailing to propose a way of engaging young people in a global debate on issues around the Copenhagen summit.

The idea arose from the World Online Debating Championship, an event which has just ended and was the first of its kind. We had entrants from 25 countries and five different continents and they told us they loved debating with young people from other cultures in a way that didn’t involve great travel expense or environmental cost.

We propose using our software, our experience and the extensive contacts we have in the global debating community, to get young people involved in a global debate around the specific issues arising from the summit.

We propose two specific elements to our event:
During the summit: We form a panel of 1,000 young people from various different countries around the world. Some members debate the issues or conclusions from the summit as they arise, others vote on these debates. This forms an up-to-the minute indication of what young people around the world think of what delegates are doing.

After the summit: Young people debate the impact of the agreements and commitments made during the summit on their own country. They discuss whether they will work, the consequences that may result and what else they would like to see happen. In this way, we take what happens during the summit into the lives of people and make it real for them. We get the opportunity to counter misconceptions and motivate people to continue the work started in Copenhagen.

We would be very grateful for any help you could give us recruiting people for our panel. We are looking for English speakers (not native, but they will need a high level of understanding of written English and the ability to write well in English). They should be under 25, be divided equally between men and women, live in all continents of the world and represent all major religions.

If this is of interest, we’d send you a short email which you could distribute to people as you see fit.

In return, we’d be happy to ask members of the panel to debate issues important to your campaign and to use them as a mechanism for discovering global youth opinion on environmental issues.

I look forward to hearing from you,

Regards,

David Crane

About us
Debatewise
Debatewise (www.debatewise.com) is a not for profit online debating site which aims to become the Wikipedia of debate. Anyone can start a debate on any subject they like and anyone can edit and strengthen that debate. This ensures that over time the strongest and most definitive arguments emerge and so provide a highly valuable resource for anyone looking to make up their mind. Debatewise was founded in 2008 and is based in the London internet hub of Hoxton, East London. Patrons include Michael Crick, Gabby Logan and Chris Heaton Harris

The International Debate Education Association:
The International Debate Education Association (www.idebate.org) was created in 1999 and acts as an independent membership organization of national debate clubs, associations, programs, and individuals who share a common purpose: to promote mutual understanding and democracy globally by supporting discussion and active citizenship locally.”

About the debaters
Our panel of debaters will include current and ex World Champions, chief adjudicators of world events and debaters from debating clubs and universities in all four corners of the globe. For more information about the World Online Debating Championship please see here: www.debatewise.com/wodc and here: www.debatewise.com/wodc-debates

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