Institute for Innovative higher Education Holds an Awards Ceremony for Classics Debate Competition
Team “Nicomaconi” receives the top prize

SeoulTech (President Kim Jong Ho) Institute for Innovative higher Education’s Center for Research in Liberal Education held the Classics Debate Competition Awards Ceremony at the President’s Office on February 12.

The ceremony was held for the 2018 Classics Debate Competition that was hosted at the ST Art Hall on January 30.
16 students in 7 teams participated in the competition based on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics and submitted reports based on the Six Thinking Hats before debating on the subject. 

The Six Thinking Hats was a method created by British psychiatrist Edward de Bono in which the subjects wear six hats with different colors and think about what the color of the hat they are wearing means. The  purposeof the exercise is for people to think differently and increase their critical thinking.

Team Nicomaconi won the top prize at the 2018 Classics Debate Competition.

Team Nicomaconi was selected as the top debate team for their definition of happiness of small things and for approaching the topic of a modern view of Aristotle's moral reasoning and viewing modern society and happiness from Aristotle’s view.

Other awards were given to the Sinabro team and the Gojeon Dojeon team.

■ Participation Review ■
-Gojeon Dojeon team Park In Woo (Bioengineering Major)

How many things are we certain of in the world?

It seems like Korean students are not given enough time to think about ourselves and the environment that surrounds us.
We may believe that we reasonably plan and do the right things, but are we truly making reasonable choices? We tend to choose what is acceptable to others and believe it be our own choice. Perhaps we do not think about the choices we can make other than predetermined choices. Reading classics gives us the courage to face uncertainty and face loneliness together.

Classics teach us of the humanity that is necessary for learning our major. Learning from our major without first learning about humanity is simply a tool that has forgotten its intent.

I believe that we were able to learn so much because SeoulTech offered a course that allowed us to read classics and debate for a month. While there were some problems such as a short time for debate, I believe that this will have been one of the most valuable times during my college experience.