UT MARA Australs 2013 Bid Announcement

Dear Australasian Debating Community,
UT MARA is proud to officially announce our intention to bid for the
Australasian Intervarsity Debating Championship 2013. You may have had a taste
of UT MARA Australs back when we hosted it in 2007 but our organisational
strength has grown leaps and bounds since then; and we fully intend to double
our last effort to bring you an Australs to remember.

UT MARA Australs 2013 will be organised in collaboration with the Malaysian
Institute for Debate & Public Speaking (MIDP) who brought this idea to fruition.
MIDP is fresh from hosting the recent STAR Asian Schools Debating Championship
2012 and its core is made up of the highly-experienced alumni of the Malaysian
debating scene who are ever ready to bring you a quality tournament.

The bid document will make its full circulation during Vic Australs 2012; but
until then, the following is the overview of our proposed bid.

Tournament Details

The maximum registration fee will be set at RM1,600 (equivalent to USD 505).
However, the Org Comm will relentlessly seek to secure sponsorship opportunities
to bring down the costs of the tournament. As it stands, we have secured main
sponsorship deals with the Malaysian Ministry of Tourism and Ministry of Higher
Education. Our university administration has also pledged to give its full
support to the hosting of the tournament.

The proposed dates for the tournament is from the 1st of July until the 8th of
July, 2013.

Our tabbing system will be the 3-tab system which has been recognized as one of
the most efficient and reliable software that is currently used for 3-on-3
debating formats. We've observed its miraculous operation in Korea Australs 2011
and MMU UADC 2012 where the tabs are regularly completed ahead of schedule. The
team consulting the UT MARA Australs 2013 are the founders and tab masters who
have successfully run multiple tab rooms at the highest international level:
Suthen "Tate" Thomas & Edwin "Clansmen" Law.

Adjudication Core

Our proposed Chief Adjudicator is MARA's own Tariq "Maketab". Having been
debating for the past eight years, Maketab has consistently broken at
international tournaments such as Asians, Australs and WUPID. He needs no
introduction in Malaysia with countless championship titles and speaker prizes
under his belt as well as his omnipresence on the adjudication core of
tournaments across the nation.

We have confirmed the support of several outstanding individuals to be on our
proposed adjudication core, including Sebastian Templeton (New Zealand), Imran
Rahim (Singapore) as well as Tasneem Elias (Qatar). We are in the midst of
confirming several others and we welcome the feedback of the community in
regards to the selection process.

Registration Policy

We are happy to announce that we are able to accommodate a team cap of 120
teams, with the possibility of increasing it to 140 teams. We will enforce the
n=1 adjudication rule. We will grant institutions three initial teams on a
first-come-first-served basis, while their remaining teams will be placed on the
waiting list.

Priority on the waiting list will be given to institutions that are yet to be
represented in the tournament. Upon exhaustion of that, we will grant one slot
at a time to institutions, in accordance to their position on the waiting list.

The registration system will be operating on the FastRego program. Effectively
used in MMU UADC 2012 and will be similarly employed for BIPEDS ABP 2012 and
Berlin Worlds 2013, its system makes it extremely convenient for institutional
representatives to alter every detail of their participation, update their
payment status and inform the organisers at one-go as well as eliminate the
prospect of multiple registrations.

Accommodation

Participants will be placed in the 5-star Grand Dorsett Hotel in Subang which
will be in convenient distance with the debating venues in UT MARA as well as
the exciting social events and breaking round venues situated all over Kuala
Lumpur.

We are excited to bring you to grand venues such as the KL Convention Centre and
the Royal Selangor Club; to cultural hotspots such as Istana Budaya which is
Malaysia's very own Cultural Theatre and the Amphitheatre of Malaysian Tourism
Centre as well as our typical Malaysian hang-outs such as the Sunway Lagoon
Resort and the Saloma Theatre Restaurant.

We need not tell you of the amazing food and tourist attractions that awaits you
in Malaysia, although you can still expect an elaborate show of it in our bid
document as well the excursion packages that we will offer participants on their
free day.

On a final note, Malaysia's debating scene is passion-driven as you can observe
with the exorbitant amount of debate tournaments we churn out every year (ie. up
to 35 tournaments in 2011). Unfortunately, financial constraints in travelling
costs have regularly hindered the participation of many growing debate
contingents to international tournaments. With this bid, we also bring the hope
of progressing Malaysian debating to the next level and an introduction of
Australs to many local universities.

If you have any queries regarding our bid, please do not hesitate to direct your
concerns to me by responding to this post or by e-mailing me at
ahmedfarisamir@.... As we will soon be meeting all of you at Vic Australs
2012, feel free to approach any member of the UT MARA contingent for
clarification as well.

We hope to have your support for UT MARA Australs 2013!

Best,
Med Faris
Proposed Convenor
UT MARA Australs 2013

SOurce: Australasians mailing list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/australs/message/2157